A dear old friend, Frank Kurtenbach, and Tom Hoffman, both of Brookings, along with myself, traveled down to Tulsa, OK to follow the SDSU Jack Rabbit wrestling squad in the Big XII Conference Wrestling Tournament on March 5th and 6th. Our SDSU grapplers are developing into a Division One powerhouse. Missouri, Oklahoma, Northern Iowa, Oklahoma State, and Iowa State finished ahead of us, but we finished 6th ahead of North Dakota State, Wyoming, West Virginia, the Air Force Academy, Utah, and Northern Colorado. What does this have to do with geese, pheasants, walleyes, or whitetail deer? Read on.

As we traveled down Hwy 75 in southern Kansas, it became readily apparent to me why Kansas is considered our #1 whitetail deer hunting state. Cornfields were bordered on all sides by numerous meandering creeks that were choked by heavy brush and trees. It was a deer paradise. As we approached the Oklahoma border, the scene changed to active oil pumpers that were apparent in many fields.

While en route, I couldn’t help commenting about gas prices and how the Biden administration shut down our fuel production after we were free of the need for foreign oil. Frank gave me his spin on fuel prices. If over the years we had been paying an extra tax dollar on every gallon of gas, we could have paid cash for infrastructure maintenance instead of going trillions of dollars in debt. Frank is right, but I will add that we will still be needing oil for the next 30-50 years until technology solves the emissions problem. Will those years be dependent on foreign oil?

Of course we discussed the war in Ukraine. Other than the senseless murder of Ukrainians including children and the destruction of property, Ukraine has been a major source of wheat. According to Ag reports on WNAX radio, the Ukraine crisis combined with a poor soy bean harvest in Argentina is going to leave a deficit in small grain.

I have no idea what Congress is going to do with Ag subsidies including the CRP (Conservation Reserve Program) that pays farmers to leave land idle, but we supposedly have 22 million acres of CRP land in our grain production areas. Assuming that 5-8 million of these acres are tillable, farmers are going to have to weigh the cost of fertilizer and putting this land into production against their subsidies. It’s certainly tempting for them. As WNAX puts it, grain prices have exploded.

In South Dakota, CRP acres are our best pheasant production areas, and putting CRP acres into production is going to hurt our pheasant production. I fully realize that pheasants are of little importance compared to the Ukraine crisis and farm income, but like most issues on the world stage, one crisis affects or trickles down to other issues.

While in Tulsa, we stayed at the downtown Hampton Inn which was right across the street from the Bok Center where the wrestling action took place. Downtown Tulsa was graced with beautiful skyscrapers and clean streets. Frank and I attended Sunday mass at the Holy Family Cathedral, an impressive structure in downtown Tulsa. As if it were addressing the fuel energy crisis, downtown Tulsa street corners were supplied with numerous electric-powered scooters supplied by the city for everyone’s use. People, mostly young, were zipping up and down the streets and sidewalks. Needless to say, I didn’t try it as I can barely walk. It was reminiscent of Copenhagen Denmark where bicycles were stacked on street corners.

In the opening paragraph, I referred to walleyes. Tom Hoffman has a cabin on the Oahe Reservoir south of Mobridge. He offered to take Frank and me walleye fishing, and hopefully, you’ll be reading about that adventure in a future column this coming summer.

As we departed for Tulsa at 6:30 A.M., I was an overnight guest at Frank’s. He has a pond in his backyard that was covered with Canada geese that strolled right up to the house. I found it interesting that many of the geese had already formed into pairs. As we traveled south on I-29 toward the Missouri border, I kept an eye peeled for the annual snow geese migration. Nothing yet.

Well, I’m no farmer, but today I ventured into uncharted waters with regard to farm programs. I expect some feedback and straightening out, so have at it.

See you next week.