While the warmer months are busiest for the Iowa State Research and Demonstration Farms, the winter months are also filled with activity.

Research on Iowa soil and climate is carried out on the farms, which are scattered throughout the state.

Local nonprofit associations of farmers own or lease 11 of the farms to Iowa State for agricultural research, according to the research and demonstration farm Web site at www.ag.

iastate.edu/farms/. The state owns the other four. Some of the farms are self-supporting, while others are funded by state appropriations and the revenue off the other farms.

Concepts studied at the farms include developing profitable farming systems for modest size, family-based farming, row spacing research and potassium and phosphorus application rates.

Research is also done in the livestock area. Animal scientists at the farms conduct beef nutrition, health and management studies, study different swine farrowing systems and study alternative breed-to-wean swine productions system, among many others.

Kent Berns, superintendent of research and development farms for Iowa State, said there is a lot of activity at the research farms during the winter months, from research to maintenance to planning.

“We spend a lot of the winter months looking ahead,” Burns said.

Berns said many farms involve research of livestock farming. During the winter months, Berns said these farms run much the same as they do in the summer, as the responsibility of raising livestock animals is continuous.

However, Berns said the winter months do add additional work to caring for the animals. Snow removal and various other winter activities also must be carried out.

The non-livestock, plant-based research must switch its focus to inside work, Berns said.

Often the busy spring, summer and fall months are spent planting, observing and harvesting, so the winter is important to catch up on office work and record keeping, he said. Summarizing data and writing reports takes up a lot of time as well.

Berns said the staff of the farms is usually smaller in the winter, since the full-time staff often utilizes vacation.

The farms do a lot of custom hiring, Berns said. Those who are custom hired include college interns and some high school students who work only during the summer months.

Berns said the research farms are important to agriculture research.

“[The research farms] provide [agricultural scientists] to get the data where it needs to be,” Berns said.

The land, climate and agriculture differ from one part of the state to the other. These farms provide a study of the solutions to many problems in each area, he said.

Berns said the research done on the farms is important both in the ISU community and in the farming community throughout Iowa.

ISU professors and classes also utilize the farms for much of their research. Agriculture 450, an agriculture management class, runs one of the farms close to Ames. Other classes use the farms to run labs and experiments.

“The research farms create an excellent hands-on learning environment for students,” said Emily Ford, junior in horticulture.

Her horticulture classes use the horticulture farm close to Gilbert to work on plant identification, transplanting plants and pruning.

The horticulture farm also helps the ISU Horticulture Club. The club conducts research to develop different varieties of apples and sell the apples to help fund their different activities.

Ford said the different farms are also positive publicity for Iowa State. When the professors and scientist do research, they can do that research under the ISU name, she said.