Harvest

Harford County government employees collected more than eight tons of food to help less fortunate residents of the county and the region in conjunction with the annual Harvest for the Hungry campaign. The food collected last week was delivered to the parking lot of the county office building at 220 S. Main St. in Bel Air Friday morning where Harford County Executive David Craig and other county officials and the staff of the Harford Community Action Agency were by joined by Harvest for the Hungry founder and Harford resident Larry Adam.

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Afghanistan's opium harvest this year has reached the highest levels ever recorded, showing an increase of almost 50 percent from last year, the head of the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, Antonio Maria Costa, said yesterday in Kabul. He described the figures as "alarming" and "very bad news" for the Afghan government and international donors who have poured millions of dollars into programs to reduce the poppy crop since 2001. He said the increase in cultivation was fueled by the resurgence of Taliban rebels in the south, the country's prime opium-growing region.

LAST YEAR'S bin-busting harvest is not going to be repeated in Maryland this year. Based on the U.S. Department of Agriculture's first estimate of the size of this year's grain crops, state farmers can expect a good harvest, but it won't set any records. "Overall, we are going to have a reasonable good crop," said state Agriculture Secretary Lewis R. Riley. "It's not going to be a great harvest, but in all honesty, the outlook for yields is pretty good." Corn yields, the best measure of how well the crop is progressing, are expected to be off 13 percent this year, according to the USDA's projection based on field conditions Aug. 1. Soybean production is expected to fare only slightly better.

The modern firearms season for deer in Maryland opened yesterday, and before the two-week season closes Dec. 11, state game managers expect another record kill from a herd that numbers more than 160,000.But, while shotgun and rifle hunters probably will kill some 35,000 deer, Department of Natural Resources Wildlife Division director Joshua Sandt said that about 77 percent of successful gun hunters will take only one deer, even though the herd size could withstand a larger harvest.Sandt said that many hunters take only one deer because one is all they need for their family table.

Maryland watermen are wrapping up their best oyster season in five years, an improvement state officials attribute to natural conditions and government efforts.The harvest for the season, which ends tomorrow, is expected to top 300,000 bushels, according to preliminary tallies by the Maryland Department of Natural Resources. That is more than three times the all-time low catch of 79,618 bushels in the 1993-1994 season, but well below the 1 million-plus harvests recorded as recently as the mid-1980s.

The Carroll County Farm Museum's annual Fall Harvest Days welcomes autumn with traditional harvest activities, crafts, food and entertainment. The two-day event will run from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and next Sunday on the museum grounds at 500 S. Center St., Westminster. The Mason-Dixon Historical Society will demonstrate shelling and threshing with old-time steam engines. Continuous on-stage entertainment Saturday will include Stillwater Band, Danielle, the Carroll County Cloggers and the WPOC featured performer, Rob Byer Band.

In all but four counties in Maryland, the harvest of deer during the muzzleloader season that ended Jan. 5 was up over the totals posted by black powder hunters during the previous season."

My 3-year-old fig tree is finally producing ripe figs. I'm a little upset, however, by the ants that crawl into the opening that appears on the bottom of the ripe fruits.Is there anything I can do about this?The small opening, referred to as the "eye," is common on most fig varieties. Ants find the sweet interior irresistible. But they do crawl out when you disturb them, and they don't usually affect the eating quality of the figs.You may be leaving your figs on the tree too long. Try to harvesting them as soon as they are fully colored and begin to droop a bit.By the way, Celeste is one of the fig varieties that is well adapted to our area.

Hunters and hunting are something Josh Sandt has dealt with in Maryland for more than 20 years. Four months ago, Sandt found himself dealing with it in a new way -- as acting director of the wildlife division of the Department of Natural Resources.Before taking over for Gary Taylor, who had taken an assignment in Washington, Sandt had been the director of Maryland's deer program, an operation he still has a keen interest in.And if the stock market were rising the way Maryland's deer herd is, happy days would indeed be here again.

The hot, dry harvest year now drawing to a close was a dismal one for the region's grain farmers, but it was slightly better than expected, according to a government survey. Farmers in Maryland and Delaware are reporting better yields than originally predicted, said Barbara Rater, director of the USDA's Maryland agriculture statistics office. With 95 percent of the corn in the bin, the U.S. Department of Agriculture is predicting that Maryland farmers will harvest 90 bushels of corn from each acre planted, an increase of nearly 6 percent over the government's October forecast of 85 bushels.