The Outstanding Missouri Grasslander Award is presented each year at the Annual Meeting of the Missouri Forage and Grassland Council/Grazing Land Conservation Initiative. The award may be given to as many as three persons annually. Awards are given in three categories: Producer, Industry, and Agency. Candidates are active participants in some aspects of the activities of Missouri grassland agriculture and have made significant contributions to some aspect or aspects of Missouri grassland agriculture.
David Davis, President of MFGC/GLCI, presented the 2009 Grasslander Awards. This year’s recipient for the Grasslander Award in the Agency category marks a first. The award was presented to The Southwest Missouri Spring Forage Conference Planning Committee. It is the first time that this award has gone to a group. This group is very deserving of this honor. This is a group of dedicated people representing two universities and five agencies across a 14 county area. This group has been around for over 25 years promoting forage and grassland management in Missouri. While not all of the current members of this group have been on the Committee all 25 years, at least one of them is a founding member and several others have been on for 24 years. They offer one of the most popular forage and grassland educational programs in the state. From its inception in the early 1980's, this program has grown from about 50 attendees to over 400 for the last several years. They typically have 30-40 commercial vendors at this event as well.
This group works year round to insure the success of their forage conference; finding quality speakers, vendors and sponsors, scheduling, advertising, developing proceedings and contracting with hotels and food service. Their hard work has definitely paid off in conducting the premier forage conference in the state—The Southwest Missouri Spring Forage Conference.
This year’s Grasslander Award for the agency category went to the Southwest Missouri Spring Forage Conference Planning Committee consisting of: Pat Adams (NRCS—Ozark), Roger Ankrom (Polk Co. SWCD—Bolivar), Gereon Brownsberger (NRCS— Greenfield), Bill Bruffett (Douglas Co. SWCD—Ava), Dr. Gordon Carriker (University Extension—Ozark), Richard Crawford (MU SW Research Center—Mt. Vernon), Mark Emerson (NRCS—Marshfield), Ben Fuqua (MSU—Springfield), Alan Garton (NRCS— Lebanon), Dee Glenn (Dade Co. SWCD—Greenfield), Curtis Gooch (NRCS—Bolivar), Mark Green (NRCS— Springfield), Myron Hartzell (NRCS—Buffalo), Aaron Hoefer (NRCS— Ozark), Chris Hoeme (NRCS—Osceola)
Deneen Jenkins (Greene Co. SWCD—Springfield), Connie Krider (Hartville), Ian Kurtz (founding member—Ozark/Willow Springs), Jamie Kurtz (NRCS—West Plains), Wyman Miller (FSA— Springfield), Tricia Radford (MDC—Springfield), Tony Rosen (Dallas County SWCD—Buffalo), Tim Schnakenberg (University Extension—Galena), Wesley Tucker (University Extension—Bolivar), and Nathan Witt (NRCS—Neosho).
