Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 6A
THE BANKS COUNTY NEWS
WEDNESDAY, JULY 26, 2017
Social
EMC Foundation awards $40,000
to agencies serving Banks County
The Jackson EMC Foun
dation board of directors
awarded a total $122,618
in grants during their June
meeting, including $40,000
to organizations serving
Banks County.
These include:
•$15,000 to the Potter’s
House, an Atlanta Mission
facility, to help feed, house,
counsel and provide edu
cational programs, such as
adult literacy, to men who
are recovering from sub
stance abuse through an
intensive residential pro
gram at this 570-acre work
ing farm in Jefferson.
•$15,000 to Auditory
Verbal Center for a thera
pist, clinical supplies, and
equipment maintenance,
repair and calibration, used
to help children under the
age of five in the coun
ties served by Jackson
EMC who have cochlear
implants overcome their
hearing loss and learn to
communicate without the
use of sign language.
•$10,000 to Piedmont
Regional Library System,
which serves Banks, Bar-
row and Jackson counties,
to cover its electronic book
system fee and hosting
costs, and purchase addi
tional Ebooks, providing a
quality selection of Ebook
titles and free access to
technology they might not
be able to afford.
Jackson EMC Foundation
grants are made possible
by the more than 185,200
participating cooperative
members who have their
monthly electric bills
rounded to the next dollar
amount through the Oper
ation Round Up program.
Their “spare change” has
funded 1,208 grants to orga
nizations and 345 grants to
individuals, putting more
than $12.2 million back into
local communities since
the program began in 2005.
Any individual or charita
ble organization in the ten
counties served by Jack-
son EMC (Clarke, Banks,
Barrow, Franklin, Gwinnett,
Hall, Jackson, Lumpkin,
Madison and Oglethorpe)
may apply for a Founda
tion grant by completing an
application, available online
at http://www.jacksonemc.
com/ foundation-guidelines
or at local Jackson EMC
offices. Applicants do not
need to be a member of
Jackson EMC.
(presentedby the members of
11.torn IC M EMDEIt SHIP / CORPOItATION
Piedmont Regional Library System
Ten Thousand & 00/100
JACKSON
V>irvu^
V(rrtjf>tir
FOUNDATION
FUNDS FOR LIBRARY
A $10,000 Jackson EMC Foundation check to the Piedmont Regional Library System will help fund the
electronic book system. At the check presentation are (from left): Joe Hicks, Jackson EMC Jefferson
district manager and Beth McIntyre, director of the Piedmont Regional Library System.
Kudzu bug causes
change in UGA research
Once a devastating presence in Geor
gia’s soybean fields and a major nui
sance to home gardeners, the kudzu bug
population has diminished over the past
three years.
“Having kudzu bugs in your field isn’t
the end of the world. It becomes prob
lematic when you have too many of
them,” said Ian Knight, a University of
Georgia College of Agricultural and Envi
ronmental Sciences graduate student.
The focus of Knight’s master’s degree
thesis is the rapid decline of kudzu bug
populations in Georgia. This unexpected decline forced
Knight to change his proposed research project from measur
ing the rising population of kudzu bugs in Georgia to determin
ing the reason for the population plummet.
Researchers developed a formula for counting the kudzu
bugs by the number of insects that filled a certain area, he said.
One cupful represented about 2,300 bugs, and two cups came
to about 4,600 bugs.
“When they were at their (population) peak, you couldn’t
count that many bugs,” Knight said. “That’s how I thought I
would be measuring kudzu bugs, (but) nope, not even close.”
Knight studied the pest and found that populations have
dropped significantly for two reasons: a parasitoid wasp and
a fungus.
The parasitoid wasp Paratelenomus saccharalis can deposit
a single egg into a kudzu bug egg. The wasp egg hatches and
feeds on the developing egg, killing the kudzu bug within.
The wasp is not native to the U.S. UGA Cooperative Exten
sion entomologist Phillip Roberts believes it may have arrived
with the original infestation of kudzu bugs in 2009. He said it
might have taken longer for the wasps to catch up with the bug
population.
“We have observed greater than 50 percent kudzu bug mor
tality in some soybean and kudzu fields due to parasitism by
this wasp,” Roberts said.
Roberts and Knight also attribute the Beauveria bassiana
fungus to the kudzu bug decline. The fungus attacks and kills
both immature and adult kudzu bugs in soybean and kudzu
fields, and UGA researchers observed kudzu bug populations
killed by the fungus.
At their population peak, kudzu bugs were a major pest for
soybean farmers in the Southeast. Roberts and fellow UGA
entomologist Michael Toews observed an average soybean
yield loss of 19 percent in untreated fields during UGA field
research trials from 2010 to 2013. The damage rose as high as
60 percent soybean yield loss in some fields.
High populations of the pests can infect and irreparably
damage soybean plants, stunting the plants’ growth, reducing
seed weight and causing a decline in the number of seeds per
pod.
Kudzu bugs are currently not a major issue, but that doesn’t
mean their populations won’t spike in the future, Roberts said.
For that reason, he implores farmers to be aware and consis
tently scout to curb any chance of a problem in the future.
(Thanks to Clint Thompson, news editor with the UGA Col
lege of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences).
Bob Waldorf is the Banks County extension agent.
Kesler reunion
planned Aug. 6
The annual Kesler reunion
will be held on Sunday, Aug.
6, at Prospect Church in Toc-
coa.
The service will begin at
10:30 a.m. with lunch to fol
low in the Family Life Center.
Those who attend are
asked to “bring a well-filled
basket.” Paper products
and utensils will be fur
nished.
Special music will be
provided by Clarke Kesler.
Please Recycle
This Newspaper
Notice of Call of 2017
General Election and
Notice of Qualifying Period
for 2017 General Election
by the Town of Homer, Georgia
The Town of Homer, Georgia will con
duct the General Election on Tuesday,
November 7, 2017 from 7:00 a.m. to
7:00 p.m., for the purpose of electing the
Mayor and Five councilmembers.
The qualifying fee for the position of
Mayor shall be $22.50 and for each
Council member shall be $12.60. All
qualified candidates are encouraged to
mn.
The qualifying for offices will be held
at Town Hall 943 Historic Homer High
way, Monday August 21,2017, 8:30 a.m.
until 4:30 p.m. and Tuesday, August 22,
8:30 a.m. until 4:30 p.m. and Wednesday
August 23, 8:30 a.m. until 4:00 p.m.
Last day to register to vote in the munic
ipal election is October 10, 2017.
Expert care.
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