Are you interested in turning your passion for growing flowers into a small business? Do you wonder which varieties to grow for florists or farmers’ market customers? Are you curious how much labor and money are needed to start a cut flower business? The Wisconsin School for Cut Flower Growers is a two-day workshop designed to help new and beginning growers learn the ins and outs of growing and marketing cut flowers.

The annual University of Wisconsin-Madison Short Course Alumni Reunion is scheduled for Saturday, Jan. 28 at Pooley’s Restaurant and Sports Bar on the far east side of Madison. The event will begin at 12:15 p.m., preceded by a social hour beginning at 11:30 a.m. As usual there will be ample door prizes donated by many agri-business companies.

Graduate from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in just 17 weeks!

According to estimates from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, food-borne pathogens account for 76 million illnesses, 325,000 hospitalizations and 5,000 deaths in the United States each year. As the food industry continues to globalize, food safety is expected to remain a significant public health issue.

Which is more difficult: growing a great crop of heirloom tomatoes, or pricing and selling them in order to make a profit? How do you control the flea beetles in the cabbage and the cucumber beetles in the melons? How do you build fertile soil using organic methods? How much can be earned from an acre of fresh vegetables, and how hard will you have to work to grow and sell them? These and many other issues will be front and center at the 2006 Wisconsin School for Beginning Market Growers.

The tree guard zipper is a hand tool that allows for quick and easy installation and removal of the corrugated plastic tree guards often used to protect young trees from deer and other types of trunk damage. In a field trial by the Healthy Farmers, Healthy Profits Project, the tree guard zipper was 37 percent faster at installing the guards and 27 percent faster at removing them than installing and removing by hand.

Scientists have obtained a detailed map of one of biology’s most important light detectors, a protein found in many species across life’s plant, fungal, and bacterial kingdoms.

Entries are due Jan. 10 for the 2006 Wisconsin 4-H Dairy Quiz Bowl competition. The event will be held Saturday, Feb. 4 at the Portage High School in Portage, Wis., starting at 9:45 a.m.

Too much phosphorus fed to dairy cows creates pollution, costs producers, and provides no benefit to cows. Likewise for too much protein in dairy diets, says a University of Wisconsin-Madison researcher. Keeping tabs on milk urea nitrogen can help farmers optimize the amount of protein they feed – with benefits for both the bottom line and the environment, says Michel Wattiaux, a dairy nutritionist at the UW-Madison’s College of Agricultural and Life Sciences.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison team placed first in Jerseys and third overall in the Intercollegiate Dairy Cattle Judging Contest at the 2005 North American International Livestock Exposition held Nov. 6 at Louisville, Ky.