Lincoln Downtown Rotary Club

Good afternoon, and thank you for inviting me to be here with you today. One of the things I'm enjoying most in my new position as University of Nebraska Vice President of Agriculture and Natural Resources and Harlan Vice Chancellor of the Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources is meeting the people who live in this state, in urban and rural areas, from Scottsbluff to Omaha, from Lincoln to Curtis, and at any number of towns - north, south, east, west - in between.

Nebraska Agribusiness Club

Thank you for inviting me to be here with you today. I've now completed four months as University of Nebraska Vice President for Agriculture and Natural Resources and Harlan Vice Chancellor of the Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources, and I welcome every opportunity that comes my way to meet and talk with Nebraska's residents. I'm particularly happy to be here with you; I appreciate your interest in agriculture, and Ed Woeppel tells me that many members of this group are very supportive of the Institute, and worked hard to create IANR in the '70s.

Comparison of Endocrine Response to Stress Between Captive-Raised and Wild-Caught Bighorn Sheep

Stress hormones in Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis canadensis), produced in response to environmental changes, road development, or high population density, may impact their immune systems to a threshold level that predisposes them to periodic, large-scale mortality. We compared the stress response to a novel environmental situation and repeated handling between bighorn sheep born and raised in captivity (CR) and bighorn sheep born in the wild (WC) and brought into captivity. We measured plasma epinephrine, norepinephrine, cortisol, and fecal glucocorticoid metabolites (FGM). Three weeks after each group’s arrival we used a one-time drop-net event to elicit an acute stress response, and we collected blood samples from each sheep over 35 minutes, as well as one fecal sample. We collected blood and fecal samples from both groups on 7 other occasions over the subsequent 6 months. We also collected fecal samples from the pen at approximately 24-hour intervals for 3 days following every handling event to monitor the stress response to handling. We found that CR sheep had a stronger autonomic nervous system response than WC sheep, as measured by epinephrine and norepinephrine levels, but we found a very similar hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis (HPA) response, measured by cortisol levels, to the acute stress event of a drop-net restraint. We also found that once the WC sheep had acclimated, as indicated by the return to the initial baseline FGM levels within 12 weeks, the CR and WC groups’ HPA responses to sampling events were not significantly different from one another. Fecal samples can provide a noninvasive mechanism for managers to monitor baseline FGM for a given herd. Using long-term monitoring of FGM rather than values from a single point in time may allow managers to correlate these levels to outside influences on the herd and better understand the impacts of management changes, population density, or increased human developments on the health of the sheep population.

Omaha Agri-Business Club Leadership Award Presentation

It is a real pleasure to present the 2006 Omaha Agri- Business Club Leadership Award this evening during National Agriculture Week. I commend the Omaha Agri-Business Club for establishing this fine award. We always need to celebrate the accomplishments of individuals whose leadership efforts contribute to our agricultural industry which is the backbone of Nebraska and our nation.

Music at the Fair! The Trans- Mississippi and International Exposition. An Interactive Website

“Music at the Fair!” gives the daily musical programs for The Trans-Mississippi and International Exposition, held in Omaha, Nebraska, June 1 through October 31, 1898. The Trans-Mississippi and International Exposition brought an unprecedented array of local, national, and international musical acts to Omaha, NE in 1898. This served to designate Omaha, "the gateway to the west" as a musical hub, as well as to incite musical excitement in the region. Some of the more popular acts featured were the Theodore Thomas Orchestra, the U.S. Marine Band, and the Apollo Club of Chicago. Many more groups and their musical programs can be found within the pages of this site. The “Music at the Fair!” website was created by Grace Carey, and last revised on May 19, 2006.It is the result of a two- year research grant funded by an Undergraduate Creative Activities and Research Experiences (UCARE) grant through the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. It is an extension of an ongoing project on music at the TME by Music Professor Peter Lefferts. The primary sources of information for the site are the following newspapers from June – November 1898: The Omaha Daily Bee, the Omaha Evening Bee, and the Omaha World Herald, and the the official programs of the fair located in the archives at the Omaha Public Library. I would like to thank the helpful staff at the Nebraska State Historical Society and the downtown branch of the Omaha Public Library. Site Creator: Grace Carey Project Advisor: Peter Lefferts, Professor of Music History at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln The linked “Document” is a flat PDF version of the interactive website. To download the fully interactive html version, click on the “Related file” to download the zipped folder. When unzipped, click on the file named “index” to enter the website.