Larchwood, Iowa — Toxicology reports are in and it appears alcohol was a factor in the accident that killed two near Grand Falls Casino in March.

The accident happened on March 14th (2013). Investigators have determined that the driver of the SUV, 39-year-old Charles J. Rice of Sioux Falls, was driving under the influence. In fact Rice, who was pronounced dead at the accident scene, had a blood alcohol level over twice the legal limit of .08 percent. Rice’s passenger, 39-year-old Kristin Loudermilk of Sioux Falls also died in the accident. Read The Full Story…

Iowa State University Extension and Outreach helps carry Iowa State’s land-grant mission beyond campus, to be the university that best serves the citizens of Iowa. With Iowa State University, Extension embraces the land-grant philosophy of:

• access to high-quality education
• research applied to the needs of Iowa, the nation, and world
• extending knowledge to strengthen Iowa’s economy and citizens’ quality of life

Iowa State University Extension does that by offering practical, how-to education based on powerful university research. It’s available to any resident of Iowa and is tailored to meet the needs of Iowans, needs we know firsthand. Extension educators, specialists, and volunteers live and work in all 99 Iowa counties.

We recently spoke with Extension Family Life Program Specialist and Certified Nature Explore Instructor Lori Hayungs about classes coming up to teach adults how to help children explore nature.

Click the play button (triangle) below to hear the report.

Rock Rapids, Iowa — It’s time for our report from the Rock Rapids Chamber. We talked to Rock Rapids Chamber Director Angie Jager recently. She told us about the city-wide rummage sales going on now, several meetings, some school activities, graduation, city-wide cleanup days, a coffee shoppe, and more.  Plus we also touched on Heritage Days, which is scheduled for June 13th through the 16th.

Click the play button below to hear the chamber report.

You can get more information by going to rockrapids.com or by calling the Chamber at 712-472-3456.

Sioux Center, Iowa — A brief Internet outage in the 11 AM hour affected Premier Communications customers in the communities of Rock Rapids and Melvin on Monday morning (4/29).

Premier Communications officials say the outage affected hundreds of customers in those communities but lasted less than an hour. They say it was caused by equipment in their facility.

Rock Rapids, Iowa — The Lyon County Sheriff’s Office reports two recent incidents.

An Ashton woman was arrested on Sunday.

They report that 48-year-old Brenda VanOort of Ashton, Iowa was arrested on an active Lyon County arrest warrant. On Friday (4/26), VanOort allegedly broke a vehicle’s windshield that did not belong to her. She is charged with Criminal Mischief in the 3rd Degree, an aggravated misdemeanor.

The Lyon County Sheriff’s Office also reports that an Ireton man was arrested on Sunday.

They say 51-year-old Eric Millis of Ireton was arrested and transported to the Lyon County Jail. He is accused of stealing merchandise from a business in Inwood on April 12. Millis is charged with Theft in the 5th Degree.

The Lyon County Sheriff’s Office has dealt with several incidents and accidents recently:

On April 23, 2013 about 4:38 PM the Lyon County Sheriff’s Department was called to investigate a two-vehicle accident in the 2900 block of Highway 9.
The driver of vehicle one was Richard Harris, age 60 of Hartley, Iowa. He was driving a 2005 Ford F150 that received about $3000 damage.
The driver of vehicle two was Robert Blankespoor, age 65, from George, Iowa. He was driving a 2013 Ford F150 that received $13,000 damage.
Harris was stopped on Highway 9 due to some construction going on. Blankespoor did not see Harris’s vehicle stopped. Blankespoor was unable to stop in time and collided with the back end of Harris’s vehicle. Blankespoor was cited for failure to stop in a safe assured distance. No one was injured in the accident.

The Lyon County Sheriff’s Department was assisted by the Iowa State Patrol. Read The Full Story…

Rock Rapids, Iowa — The Rock Rapids City Council met in regular session last night (Monday, 4/22).

First, they held a public hearing about what to do about the former Bakery building downtown, 214 First Avenue. The building has had several tenants in the past, including KD Creations and Trophies Plus, but has been vacant for several years and has now fallen into disrepair, including a crack through a heavy plate glass window. The city boarded up the windows due to safety concerns. The owner, an LLC from Maryland, cannot be reached after several attempts, including the use of paper service. Read The Full Story…

Storm-Damaged Trees

The recent ice storm has left many trees with broken branches and many yards filled with mounds of debris. Much of the breakage occurred to mature, deciduous trees with inflexible branches and trunks. Ice accumulation on tree limbs can increase their weight by 30 times or more. Fortunately, some trees fared much better such as evergreens and young trees. Their more flexible limbs allowed them to bend quite a bit without breaking. In my front yard, the crown of our paper birch was encased in ice. The extra weight caused it to bow down to where the branches were just a few feet off the ground. Luckily, when the ice melted the tree stood back up and resumed its natural shape.

Evaluating the damage and assessing the long-term survival of injured trees is not always easy. If a tree has significant damage it may need to be removed. For example, if a tree has lost a large portion of its crown (over 60%), or if an injury results in the loss of more than one-third of the bark around the circumference of the main trunk, the tree may struggle to survive. Trees can usually handle minor damage to the trunk or the top or broken side branches. If it is unclear whether the tree is at risk and it is in a location where it will not create a hazard, you might leave the tree to see how it responds over time.

For trees that need trimming, it is recommended that the pruning of large trees be left to a professional tree care specialist such as a trained arborist. A specialist should also be called if the damaged tree or branch is leaning on another tree or on a structure.  Contact your utility company if an injured tree or branch is around power lines. When hiring help for tree care, check with your town to see if tree services or arborists need to be licensed to work in your community. Ask to see proof of insurance for personal and property damage and workers’ compensation.  It also doesn’t hurt to ask for local references. If you can, get cost estimates from several tree care professionals and request a written estimate that lists all the work that is to be done. Pay for the job after all the work agreed upon has been completed. Plus, avoid letting anyone “top” your trees. Topping can rob the tree of much of its food producing ability and is a discouraged practice. Often topped trees respond by sending out multiple shoots at the pruned ends. These branches are weakly attached and tend to break easily in wind, snow or ice storms.

When trimming a storm damage tree, the broken branches or branch stubs should be pruned back to the collar of the larger limb or trunk to which they are attached. Wounds can provide entry areas for decay-causing organisms. Trees respond to a wound by “walling-off” or compartmentalizing the injured tissue. This protects the tree from disease, insects and rot. Breakage caused by the storm may have resulted in large, uneven stubs. The goal of pruning is to minimize the wound and aid the tree in prompt and proper wound closure.

Proper pruning cuts should be made to the outside of the collar and branch bark ridge (the raised strip of bark). The branch collar and the branch bark ridge are the boundary between the branch and trunk. Pruning cuts that injure or remove the collar leave tissue open to disease and decay. Therefore, don’t make flush cuts, which leave bigger wounds that are difficult for a tree to “wall-off.”

If you need to remove a large limb, use a 3-cut technique to prevent the branch from tearing away as it is being cut thus causing a greater injury. To begin, make the first cut on the underside of the branch approximately six to twelve inches from the point of attachment. Make the cut about halfway through the branch. The second cut is made on the top of the branch one inch further out than the first cut. From the top down cut through the branch. As the second cut is made the weight of the branch may cause it to break at the pivot point between the two cuts. Once the branch falls, the final cut is made outside the branch collar. For more information on pruning, see Iowa State University Extension and Outreach publication, Pruning Trees: Shade, Flowering, and Conifer (www.iowadnr.gov/portals/idnr/uploads/forestry/pruning.pdf).

If you want more information on storm-damaged trees, see ISU Extension and Outreach publication, Managing Storm-Damaged Trees now posted on Lyon, O’Brien, Osceola, Sioux and Dickinson County Extension websites.

If you have any questions, please feel free to email me at mmurphy@iastate.edu, or phone (712) 472-2576 or contact your local County Extension office. Additional information was provided by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources article, Managing Storm Damaged Trees (www.iowadnr.gov/portals/idnr/uploads/forestry/storm_management.pdf).

Contact information: Margaret Murphy • 712 472-2576 (Office) • 605 521-7893 (Cell) • mmurphy@iastate.edu

Rock Rapids has declared a Snow Emergency.

There is to be no parking on city streets. If cars are parked on the streets between 2 and 6 AM, they will be subject to ticketing and towing.

Des Moines, Iowa — The weekly Iowa crop report from the USDA has no surprises. Farmers have had very little opportunity for field work, they’re way behind compared to last year, and it’s been much colder. But the good news is our moisture is recharging.

In fact, according to the National Drought Monitor, at the end of October of last year, in our four northwesternmost Iowa counties, there were fairly large portions of Lyon and Sioux Counties in the worst category of drought — exceptional drought. The rest of the four-county area was listed in “extreme” drought. Fast forward five and a half months to today — and basically the whole four-county area has improved to the next category, which admittedly is still called “severe drought”. There is just a very small area in the very southwest corner of Sioux County that’s still listed as “extreme”. So it’s still dry, but there’s been marked improvement. The eastern third of the state is no longer experiencing drought of any kind.

In the short term, wet conditions in Iowa during the week ending April 21, 2013 continued to limit fieldwork according to the USDA, National Agricultural Statistics Service. Snow was received in northern Iowa, while precipitation was mostly rain in southern Iowa. The additional moisture did help to improve both top and subsoil moisture levels. Statewide there was an average of 0.3 days suitable for fieldwork during the week.
Topsoil moisture levels rated 3 percent very short, 6 percent short, 60 percent adequate and 31 percent surplus. Subsoil moisture levels rated 14 percent very short, 32 percent short and 48 percent adequate and 6 percent surplus.

Oat planting was 22 percent complete, far behind last year’s 93 percent and the five-year average of 68 percent.

Pasture and range condition rated 18 percent very poor, 27 percent poor, 38 percent fair and 15 percent good and 2 percent excellent. Spring calving losses were higher than normal due to the wet and cool weather.

In fact, Sibley was reported as both the coldest and snowiest in the state this week. While rain fell early in the week for most of Iowa, snow fell in northwest Iowa late Wednesday (17th) through Thursday (18th). The resulting snowfall totals were in the neighborhood of 4-6 inches in northwest Iowa including 8 inches reported over two days, Wednesday (17th) and Thursday (18th), in Sibley. Sibley’s low on Saturday was 11 degrees.

For the whole crops and weather report, visit this story’s page at kiwaradio.com.

IOWA PRELIMINARY WEATHER SUMMARY
Provided by Allan Curtis, Assistant Climatologist
Midwestern Regional Climate Center
The past week varied greatly across the state for both temperature and precipitation. Precipitation was widespread early in the week, predominantly on Wednesday (17th) and Thursday (18th), with areas in south-central, southeast, and east-central Iowa receiving widespread totals of 4-5 inches or more of rain. The greatest rainfall totals during the week came from Pella with 8.71 inches, and the greatest 1-day total was 6.76 inches in Centerville on Wednesday (17th). While rain fell early in the week for most of Iowa, snow fell in northwest Iowa late Wednesday (17th) through Thursday (18th). The resulting snowfall totals were in the neighborhood of 4-6 inches in northwest Iowa including 8 inches reported over two days, Wednesday (17th) and Thursday (18th), in Sibley. The statewide precipitation for the week was one of the wetter ones in recent history with 2.79 inches, nearly tripling the normal of 0.96 inches.
Temperatures across the state were well below normal with the western half of Iowa taking the brunt of the unseasonably cold temperatures to the tune of 12 to 15 degrees below normal for the week. Statewide, the average temperature was 39.3 degrees, 12.1 degrees below normal. Southeast Iowa was the closest to normal at -8.7 degrees below normal. The worst of the cold came mid-week when large areas of western Iowa saw temperatures as much as 20 degrees below normal. All of the warmest temperatures during the week occurred on Monday (15th) or over the weekend, Saturday (20th) and Sunday (21st), when temperatures were in the mid-70s. The highest temperature was 77 degrees at Mt. Pleasant on Monday (15th) and the lowest temperature was 11 degrees at Sibley on Saturday (20th).
Four inch soil temperatures during week averaged in the upper 30’s in the northwest to the upper 40’s in the southeast as of Sunday (21st). One day soil temperatures, as of Sunday (21st), showed temperatures recovering from the mid-week chill with low 40’s in the northwest ranging to low 50’s in the southeast.

Click here for the whole report.