The Des Moines Register from Des Moines, Iowa • Page 129

FARM CLASSIFIEDS INSIDE Sunday September 29, 2002 JERRY PERKINS, Farm Editor 51 5-284-8456e-mail: perkinsjnews.dmreg.com Dc0 lUoinc Sttnbay fleeter Regulations hamper protection of elevators Iowa company capitalizes on unique kernels IOWA AGRICULTURE The U.S. Department of Agriculture will meet this week with state secretaries of agriculture, who fear that a new USDA rule could end protection from elevator failures for grain producers. Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Patty Judge is one of Compact: Specialty Popcorn kernels, left, are smaller than conventional popcorn. Popcorn BUSINESS: Growing, processing and marketing popcorn ADDRESS: 3282 62nd Shellsburg, la. 52332 OWNERS: Gene and Lynn Mealhow PHONE: (800) 330-I0WA WEB SITE: kandkpopcorn.com E-MAIL: lmealhowkandkpopcorn 1-1 several state secretaries of airi-itiiltiipB Bgl HU11U1 who asked the government farm agency to rescind the fi nal regulations implementing the US.

Ware Judge rr house Act of 2000. Judge said the new regu lations could leave Iowa grain producers without protection when federally licensed grain elevators fail. i m-nT-; With harvest underway, farmers are hauling millions of bushels of corn and soy -V beans to local grain elevators tor storage. If the new rule stays in Judge said, Iowa pro I. HARRY BAUMERTREGISTER PHOTOS Eyeing the crop: Gene Mealhow's heirloom popcorn seeds produce multiple stalks per plant, with many tiny ears.

ducers who store their gram at a federally licensed ware- house without a gram deal er's license would not be protected by the state's Grain Indemnity Fund. Raw product: Specialty Popcorn is available unpopped in 1-, 2-, 5- and 50-pound bags. It also is sold pre-popped in several flavors. The fund was set up in 1986 to protect Iowa producers and grain depositors in case an elevator goes out of bus ness without being able to meet its grain storage obligations. "I have grave concern over what seems to be a USDA move to stop the protections Iowa gives producers who sell their grain to federally licensed gram elevators, By STEVE MEYER REGISTER CORRESPONDENT Shellsburg, la.

Popcorn owners Gene and Lynn Mealhow are building a business from an unusual variety of popcorn seed that produces up to 30 ears per stalk, which is three times as many ears as normal popcorn. The corn is easier to digest because it is small and essentially hull-less. The Mealhows, Judge wrote in letter to U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman. I am urging the USDA to back away from this position and rescind this new rule.

Matt Lloyd, USDA deputy press secretary, said the new I -11 rrv fx, "-J (Shellsburg. rule was issued in early Au who began marketing the popcorn three years ago, already have made sales gust to comply with a change in the law approved by DES MOINES Sorting: Lynn Mealhow helps popcorn kernels process through a fanning mill, which removes foreign matter. Congress. never run across that particular species of corn, Mealhow said. Mealhow worked with Kelty on cultivation techniques and eventually got the corn to the point where it was a good producer.

In more recent years, Mealhow said, the emphasis has been to increase the number of ears produced per stalk. The record is 36 ears, which compares with 10 ears per stalk for normal popcorn, he said. Mealhow and his wife, Lynn, took over Popcorn when Kelty retired in 1999. They hired contract growers, who have planted the corn on between 150 to 320 acres per year. If the European broker is successful in developing an overseas market, Mealhow said, as many as 35 contract growers are available next year to plant Popcorn on 1,000 acres.

The Mealhows received two forgivable loans from the state to buy processing equipment, capable of handling 2,000 pounds a day, and storage facilities. Register Business Editor David Elbert contributed to this article. "This represents no change in USDA policy," Lloyd said. Ve re committed to work ing with the state departments of agriculture to re solve this. Our mam concern is protecting the farmers' interest." Last year, Judge said, the Mte.2oo t0 Macys New York and are working with a broker who believes there is a market in Europe.

Popcorn also is available in many Hy-Vee and Fareway stores in Iowa. The seed is an "heirloom" variety that Richard Kelty of Urbana began raising and selling on a small scale to neighbors after he retired from a military career 20 years ago, Gene Mealhow said. It produces unusually small popping kernels and has been grown in eastern Iowa since at least the 1850s. Family legend holds that was a market for the variety because of its unusual nutty flavor and the fact that the tiny hulls virtually cooked away during the popping process, making the finished product easier to digest. Mealhow, who is a farmer and soil consultant, began working with Kelty during the 1980s because stalks were "falling down and not producing." Kelty at one point sent samples of the popcorn to a lab at Purdue University to see if the kernels could be identified.

The lab wrote back, saying it had Kelty's great-great-grandfather obtained the seed from American Indians when he settled in eastern Iowa in 1854. The seed was grown by Kelty's ancestors for personal consumption, but was never sold commercially until Kelty discovered that neighbors would pay him for the special corn. Kelty had received a handful of the family corn from a relative after he retired, and he planted it in his garden, Mealhow said. When Kelty shared the corn with friends and neighbors, he realized there Iowa Gram Indemnity Fund paid almost $700,000 to Io-wans who stored grain in the Crestland Cooperative, a federally licensed grain ele vator that filed for bankrupt cy last falL Headed to New Mexico: Nate Mealhow stacks 50-pound bags "Without this help, many of those producers would have of Specialty Popcorn, bound for Albuquerque, N.M. found it very dirticult to stay in business," Judge said in the letter to Veneman.

We can not allow this rule to stay in effect. In these already stressed economic times, we need our producers to be Once-thriving bison industry wallows in market tailspin protected, not have those protections taken away by a badly thought-out rule. Iowa has 520 grain ware houses and dealers. Of those, 132 hold federal grain elevator licenses. Jerry Perkins, farm editor hundreds due partly to a glut of bison and unmet expectations that Americans would trade their beef, pork and chicken for a meat lower in fat and cholesterol.

Like ranchers everywhere, those in Minnesota's bison business are longing for a rebound. The outlook may be better here. Minnesota ranchers have largely escaped drought conditions crippling their peers out west. The state is helping get buffalo on supermarket shelves. The meat is finding its way onto more menus in the restaurant- ASSOCIATED PRESS Luverne, Minn.

Leaning against the metal bars of a sun-baked corral, Gary Nielsen scanned the bison waiting for auction, pausing to jot down impressions and tag numbers. Nielsen liked placid No. 7, a 3-year-old female. He ruled out No. 14, a snorting bull he couldnt picture mixing well with George, Gertrude, Millie and Hortence the four he took home from last year's bison sale at Blue Mounds State Park.

"He's too wild for my pen," said Nielsen, who has been dense Twin Gties. Bison, the scientific name for an animal commonly called buffalo, have stormed back from near extinction a century ago, making huge strides in the last decade. They now number about 350,000 nationwide, including more than 11,000 in Minnesota, according to industry groups. Breeders saw herd values plummet. Ground buffalo, for example, is hard to find for less than $4 a pound; the national average for lean ground beef was about $2.60 a pound this summer.

fascinated with the shaggy beasts since a childhood trip to the Black Hills. Now 54, he is slowly building a herd near his fields of corn and soybeans in southern Minnesota. Bison ranching is a hobby for Nielsen, and he has no immediate plans to sell his animals for breeding or for meat which is fortunate for him. The nation's bison industry, which sizzled through much of the 1990s, is struggling to pull out of a tailspin. Animals that once commanded thousands of dollars a head at auction now go for Q.

The Web Check current stock prices and other business news at DesMoinesRegister.com business BRIAN KORTHALS ASSOCIATED PRESS Afternoon romp: An 8-year-old bull bison rolls in a patch of dirt to scratch itself and rid itself of insects. A Farm Real Estate Specialists 7 We 9m 1603 22nd Stc. 109, V. Des Moines, IA 50266 www.agrifinance.com 515-225-4300 33.