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Photos of Extension in Action

NC Biological and Agricultural Extension Teaches & Trains | Helps | Encourages and Solves Problems for the people.

Extension Teaches and Trains People...

Photo: Farmers and agricultural technicians sit in a workshop on machinery calibration and maintenance. Photo: An extension specialist is helping farmers understand a calculation problem in land application of animal waste. Photo: Dr. Grabow is standing near a large switch box pointing out control features for an irrigation system.
A technical program is presented on machinery calibration and maintenance. Extension provides farmers with technical training for current and new technologies. Extension specialist teach irrigation controls to irrigation contractors.
Photo: Contractors wearing safety vest and hard hats stand in a stream bed. A stream restoration project is underway at this location and workshop attendees can listen and watch as an extension specialist explains what is being done. Photo: An extension associate is showing a worker of the Department of Transportation an extension poster on road maintenance. The poster is propped up against a vehicle. Photo: Contractors at this extension workshop look on as extension personnel use a temporary technique to stabilize a bank while work in underway.
Extension offers contractor training and certification. A DOT worker reviews a poster about the impacts of road maintenance on water quality. Contractors learn about the environmental impacts and unique challenges of in-stream restoration work.
Photo: At a Stream restoration training workshop contractors watch as large boulders are put into place with machinery. Photo: An extension specialist is standing on a hill of paving rocks as she explains how the rocks prevent erosion only if they are spread to the proper depth and width. Photo: An extension specialist explains the use of a stone structure at an outdoor field site.
Engineering construction firm personnel learn the proper techniques to size, maneuver and stack boulders along a stream bed for restoration projects. Erosion and Sediment Control workshop are held at the Soil and Water Training Area of NCSU's Lake Wheeler complex Raleigh N.C. Extension workshops train contractors and engineers to follow guidelines and laws when constructing structures like this in-stream cross vane
Photo: a group is gathered around a green table with technical papers and workbook. Photo: An extension specialist is giving a lecture to a group of environmental engineers. Photo: An extension associate is helping participants of a stormwater workshop understand a problem on a worksheet.
Extension workshops review technical aspects of project development with engineers working for contractors.
 
Photo: Photo: Irrigators attend a land application workshop and learn how to calibrate the different kinds of nozzles. Photo: Municipal engineers attending a water quality monitoring workshop work on their laptops while two extension assistants stand by. One person is asking a question of the extension associate. Photo: a group of regulators and municipal engineering personnel listen to an extension engineer explain changes that can be made to control stream overflow.
Irrigators gather at a training program to review and learn about the use of different sprinkler heads. Engineers are updating their skills in applying engineering software to water quality and monitoring projects. Bio & Ag Extension engineers evaluate and recommend engineering solutions to state regulators and local municipalities.
Photo: An extension specialist talks to folks about the completed rain garden as they gatther around to inspect it and learn what a rain garden does. Photo: and Extension specialist is touring folks around a wetland to explain the function of a wetland. Photo: The extension specialist and and interested group are learning about the drainage area next to the roadway and what its function is.
Stormwater management techniques are of great interest to municipalities resolving water problems and protecting natural areas.

Extension Helps People...

Photo: large tanks full of fish are seen through the barn door at the NC State Fish Barn. Photo: a group gathers around a drainage ditch and creek checking out a problem. Photo: A green one-story high agricultural machine moves through rows of tobacco as it harvests the leaves.
Extension assists in the support and development of the state's industries like aquaculture indoor tank farming. Extension works with engineers, developers, county extension associates and others to solve environmental problems and apply new technologies. Extension programs assists farmers with machinery operations, production, maintenance and safety issues.
Photo: Extension Specialist is explaining to a farmer what area he intends to mark off using his backpack GPS system. Photo: An extension associate lifts a sweet potato out of a packing crate as they are about to be handled and packaged. Photo: An extension associate displays a tray full of small creatures and explains how they tell the story of a healthy ecosystem.
Extension helped this farmer plan a crop maze that will attract people to his farm. Many farms in N.C. create seasonal mazes to provide extra farm income.

Extension helps farmers with post-harvest processing techniques for commodities like sweet potatoes that need special handling.

Extension helps people learn how to spot and address unhealthy ecosystems.
Photo: Tobacco is being harvested as a farmer looks on with two extension accociates. Photo: A rain barrel sits next to a loading ramp at this business. Water collected will irrigate the around the building. Photo: Extension specialists test the septic and well systems on this farm for homeowners with unusual problems.
Extension helps farmers find better harvesting practices. Extension works with business and homeowners to conserve and save money by harvesting roof top rain water for irrigation. Extension assists homeowners with water issues.

Extension Encourages Community Involvement...

Photo: An Extension associate explains to the neighborhood how the rain garden should work and how handle minimal upkeep. Photo: Two people view an extension poster about the North River Wetland Restoration Project. Photo: Extension associates, Bio & Ag students and the community are busy planting trees on a slope to stop erosion.
This neighborhood installed a rain garden to solve their stormwater problem. Extension displays inform and explain environmental projects to the public encouraging communities to take action. The entire neighborhood came out to plant trees to prevent soil erosion into a nearby stream.
Photo: People are gathered around and an extension associate who is explaining stream erosion problems. Photo: Extension specialist explain some of the newest technologies for the creation of biofuels. In the background is a new machine. Photo: These folks are on a tour of a worm farm near Raleigh N. C. to discover how this operation works. Everyone is crowded into a large shed building.
Through environmental education programs and tours the public can learn about their watersheds and how they can improve water quality. Farmers attend the state's Annual Extension Biofuel Day in North Carolina to learn how to use this developing technology to power up their farms and reduce operation costs. The Annual Extension Vermicomposting Conference attracts interested worm farmers from all over the state and beyond.
A group listens to an extension specialist explain the different types of feed stocks that can be used to make biofuel. He is holding a sweet sorghum stalk that looks like a corn stalk. Photo: An extension specialist wearing a white lab coat and gloves works with a chicken farmer to learn how to use new technologies for indoor air quality. Photo: A group crowds into the NC State Fish Barn to learn how tank farming works.
Students and their teachers learn about biofuel feed stocks like sweet sorghum. Biofuels are in their future. Extension encourages produces to test for air quality in animal housing. Extension provides tours of the NC State Fish barn to learn about this different form of farming fish in tanks.
Photo: A view from the top of a school roof where students look like little specks as they assemble into a human mascot sketched out using GPS coordinates. Photo: An extension specialist working with two girls to understand and assemble solar project. Photo: 15 middle school students wait on lines to use a hands-on demonstration showing how water filtrates through soil layers.
Teachers and students get a little help from extension using GPS coordinates to map out the school's mascot. Extension plans and organizes the 4-H Electric Congress motivating youth in the subject of energy. Extension summer campers get a hands-on lesson in drainage. Programs like these get kids interested.

Extension Solves Problems...

Photo: A group of four men are looking over plans for land development. Photo: A machine digs a ditch and also lays out irrigation piping. Photo: A farmer and extension agent are talking on the dirt road between the hog houses they are near the huge air handling fans on the side of one of the hog houses.
Land development planning Irrigation & drainage systems Animal housing and environments
Photo: A group looks into a ditch where there are two temporary silt fences erected. These fabric fences reduce water flow and retain sediment in order to prevent off-site sedimentation during an on-going project. Photo: A pesticide tank sits on the back of a row crop sprayer as the extended pole sprayers target pesticide to the plant. Finding improved ways to spread pesticides and fertilizers to reduce drift, and improve accuracy of the application is achieved with machinery design. Photo: shows a lateral-move irrigation system working in a field and control unit in the foreground.
Soil and water issues Pesticide application Irrigation controls and techniques
Photo: A backhoe loader buries new organic materials into the compost pile. The photo shows steam emitting from the pile as it is turned. Photo: An extension assistant stands in a water retention area checking plants in the wet flodded area. Photo: Extension specialist employ environmental engineering students to plant the wetland area.
Municipal composting Stormwater management Wetland construction
An extension specialist is working on the process for on-farm biofuel production. He is pouring a mash into a flat pan and on a flat bed is a white tank. Photo: and extension specialist looks machinery preperations in the field. Photo: A smaller designed usit fmoves through a field spraying pesticide Smaller utility trucks are being retrofited to do jobs that larger machinery can do. Farmers who having machinery options can keep oprating costs down.
Bioenergy Farm operations Applied machinery design