Copyright (c) 2013 Utah State University All rights reserved. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs Recent documents in SSWA Faculty Publications en-us Sat, 02 Mar 2013 01:41:29 PST 3600 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/438 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/438 Thu, 28 Feb 2013 13:10:05 PST We report the results of LA-ICP-MS analysis of 402 quartzite samples representing 48 collection loci in the Upper Gunnison Basin (UGB), Colorado and determine the extent to which the sources can be geochemically discriminated from one another using this non-destructive technique. The ability to differentiate among the sources would open the door to provenance studies of the quartzite chipped-stone tools and debitage that constitute 95% or more of most of the 3000-plus prehistoric site assemblages documented in the UGB. Our samples represent prehistorically quarried and non-quarried quartzite sources, including outcrop (primary) and gravel (secondary) deposits. The results reveal spatial and chronological trends in quartzite elemental composition that can be exploited for provenance determinations of quartzite artifacts from UGB sites, albeit using an assemblage-based sourcing strategy that differs from the familiar approach of “matching” obsidian artifacts to their statistically likeliest geological source. We offer a preliminary version of a sourcing protocol for UGB quartzite.

]]> Bonnie L. Pitblado et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/437 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/437 Fri, 30 Nov 2012 08:49:27 PST To better understand attachment from a cross-cultural and historical perspective, I have amassed over 200 cases from the ethnographic and archaeological records that reveal cultural models (D'Andrade and Strauss 1992) of infancy. The 200 cases represent all areas of the world, historical epochs from the Mesolithic to the present and all types of subsistence patterns (Appendix 1). The approach is inductive where cases with similar models of infancy are clustered into archetypes. My principal finding from this analysis is that, in the broadest overview, infants are, effectively, placed on probation and not immediately integrated into the society. Attachment failure is not seen as a potential problem but, rather, premature attachment to an infant whose existence may be fleeting is to be guarded against. Most societies view infants and even children as not-yet-persons. Infants are born into a state of liminality or incompleteness. Among the Wari, a baby is compared to unripe fruit as it is "still being made"; (Conklin and Morgan 1996: 672) and the Nankani reserve judgment on the infant's humanity until they can be certain it is not a spirit or bush child (Denham et al 2010: 608). My presentation of results will first identify the main factors that give rise to delaying personhood and, second, to the cultural models which justify and guide the transformation of babies into persons. Variability in the way this non-personhood is characterized and in the steps that must occur to complete the process of constructing a person is great but not infinite. Hence, in the second half of the chapter, I will identify and discuss several archetypal cultural models of infancy.

]]> David F. Lancy http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/435 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/435 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:50 PDT B. Barham et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/436 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/436 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:50 PDT Douglas B. Jackson-Smith et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/434 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/434 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:49 PDT In recent years, there has been growing public attention to an apparent decline in the rate at which young people have been entering the Wisconsin farm sector. Interest in farm entry arises from a public policy concern that if too few young people enter farming in the coming decade, the viability of the Wisconsin farm sector in general, and the dairy industry in particular, could be threatened. A number of public and private initiatives to assist beginning farmers have been proposed, and a few programs including subsidized loans and planning for a computerized land-link system to match entering and exiting farmers-were initiated in the first half of 1994 by various agencies of the state government.

]]> Douglas B. Jackson-Smith http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/433 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/433 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:48 PDT F. H. Buttel et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/432 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/432 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:47 PDT For several years there have been growing concerns about the long-run decline of farm incomes and the future viability of the dairy industry in Wisconsin. These problems are sometimes attributed to declining milk prices, and indeed the average milk price per hundredweight received by Wisconsin farmers has declined by over 40 percent since 1980 when inflation is taken into account. But there is now little optimism that the long-term decline of milk prices can be reversed. There is virtually no chance that the 1995 Farm Bill will raise the federal support price for milk products, and if anything there may be a decline in federal outlays for dairy price supports. It is likewise unclear whether there will be fundamental changes in federal milk marketing order arrangements that disadvantage producers form the Upper Great Lakes states.

]]> B. Barham et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/431 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/431 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:47 PDT B. Barham et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/430 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/430 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:46 PDT Douglas B. Jackson-Smith et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/428 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/428 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:45 PDT F. H. Buttel et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/429 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/429 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:45 PDT Anyone who travels through the Wisconsin countryside and speaks with an average farm operator will quickly come to appreciate the acute sense of anxiety about the future of agriculture that permeates rural life in the state. Long hours, a lack of vacation time, declining commodity prices, and rising farm expenses have all contributed to a growing inability to find young people interested in taking over Wisconsin farm operations. The loss of farms - particularly dairy farms - in many regions of the state has placed stress on the economic vitality and cultural identities of rural communities that have traditionally depended on farming.

]]> Douglas B. Jackson-Smith http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/427 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/427 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:44 PDT Over the past 20 years, a significant amount of state and federal money has been spent researching the impacts of farming activities on water quality in Wisconsin. Manure and nutrient management practices have been identified as critical variables affecting the environmental performance of most farms in the state. To protect surface and groundwater resources, a number of technical and managerial solutions have been designed to minimize nutrient leaching and runoff from barnyards and farm fields. An impressive array of educational programs, financial subsidies, and regulatory incentives has been employed to encourage livestock producers to manage their manure in environmentally responsible ways. Because of the considerable public investment in this area, it is perhaps surprising that there have been few efforts to systematically analyze the degree to which farmers in Wisconsin are following recommended practices.1 This report provides a profile of the manure storage and handling practices on a random sample of Wisconsin livestock operations in the spring of 1995. First, the results are presented for livestock farms overall, and adoption patterns on dairy farms are contrasted to those of other kinds of livestock enterprises. Next, data for dairy farms are explored in more detail to look for patterns related to the scale of the operation. The third section outlines the farm and household characteristics of producers who do and do not use various practices. The report concludes with a discussion of what we know and don’t know about Wisconsin livestock farmers’ adoption of recommended manure management practices, a brief analysis of reasons for the patterns we observed, and a review of the implications of our results for university scientists, Cooperative Extension faculty, state policy makers, and others seeking to improve the effectiveness of manure and nutrient management programs.

]]> Douglas B. Jackson-Smith et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/425 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/425 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:43 PDT M. Edwards et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/426 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/426 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:43 PDT One of the most dramatic trends in American farm-structural change over the past several decades has been the industrialization of livestock production. Many now expect that dairying in the United States will be the next major livestock sector to succumb to the industrialization trend. This paper utilizes a multidimensional definition of industrialization to critically examine evidence for and against the dairy industrialization hypothesis. The authors find that while there is a persistent trend toward larger units of production, and a geographical shift towards states with more industriallike farm operations, the penetration of industrial relations of production has occurred more slowly and incompletely than many have assumed. The paper concludes by noting how unique characteristics of the dairy sector help explain the uneven character of the industrialization process in the United States.

]]> Douglas B. Jackson-Smith et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/423 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/423 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:42 PDT F. H. Buttel et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/424 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/424 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:42 PDT M. Edwards et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/422 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/422 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:41 PDT In the late winter and early spring of 1999, the Program on Agricultural Technology Studies (PATS)2 surveyed over 1,600 of Wisconsin’s dairy farmers. Because the sample was large, was drawn randomly from the Wisconsin Dairy Producers List, and yielded a relatively high response rate (50 percent), the results provide a scientifically reliable snapshot of the Wisconsin dairy farming sector as of the spring of 1999. This report provides an overview of the initial findings of the overall study. The emphasis of this report is on the characteristics of the Wisconsin dairy farming sector, and on the characteristics of the operators and their families. We pay particular attention to Wisconsin dairy farmers’ use of a wide range of dairy and crop production technologies or practices. In this survey, we also included questions about several emerging technologies, like genetically engineered crops and “information technologies” (such as use of computers and the internet, and precision farming). This report summarizes the results for all dairy farms in the sample (usually on the far right hand side of each table). Because dairy farms in Wisconsin are quite diverse, we also disaggregate the results for dairy herds of different size. The tables below report the characteristics of farms in five herd size categories: 1-24 cows, 25 to 49 cows, 50 to 99 cows, 100 to 199 cows, and 200 or more cows. In each case, herd size measures include both milking cows and dry cows. More detailed reports and indepth analyses of specific issues based on the survey will become available over the coming months.

]]> F. H. Buttel et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/420 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/420 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:40 PDT Over the last decade, the Program on Agricultural Technology Studies (PATS) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison has received a wide range of formal and informal comments from Wisconsin farmers regarding the direction of university research and extension programs. In an era of declining Extension budgets, increasing privatization, and a rapidly changing farm structure, the debate about where to focus scarce public resources takes on an added significance. Is there still an important role for land grant institutions to play in agriculture in the new century? If so, how can limited resources be targeted most effectively? What do farmers and other citizens want from the land grant system? In order to systematically solicit farmer feedback on these issues, a series of questions about research and extension programs at the University of Wisconsin was included in the PATS 1999 Wisconsin Dairy Farm Poll, a statewide survey sent to 1,600 randomly selected dairy farmers. While the results summarized below focus primarily on the responses of dairy farmers, similar questions were asked of other types of farms in a separate survey sent out at the same time. In general, the response patterns of the nondairy farmers were similar to those of the dairy farm sample.

]]> M. Ostrom et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/421 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/421 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:40 PDT Farming in Wisconsin has undergone considerable change in the last few decades. U.S. Census statistics suggest that the state lost almost 13 percent of its farms and over 10 percent of its farmland between 1987-1997. The decline in farm numbers was particularly severe for mid-sized commercial livestock farms. During this period, the number of hog farms dropped by almost 60 percent, dairy farms fell by 40 percent, and farms with any harvested cropland declined by more than 20 percent (Buttel, 1999). Meanwhile, when dairy and hog farm number declines are removed from the equation, census results show that there was actually significant growth in part-time and hobby farm numbers during the 1990s in Wisconsin. While the periodic Census of Agriculture provides some key insights into the long-term trends in the Wisconsin farm sector, the Census asks relatively few questions about a number of important topics. Specifically, there is little information gathered about the use of different agricultural technologies or management practices. In addition, despite the fact that most Wisconsin farms are run as family businesses, there is virtually no information collected about members of the farm household (other than the lead operator) or the household’s involvement in off-farm as well as farming activities. Finally, the Census asks no questions about the opinions or views of Wisconsin farmers concerning important public policy questions.

]]> Douglas B. Jackson-Smith et al. http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/419 http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/sswa_facpubs/419 Mon, 08 Oct 2012 09:59:39 PDT M. Edwards et al.