Vol. 9, No. 02, February 2013 |
 Printer-Friendly PDF Version |
Greatest SART Meeting Ever?
Dr. Joan Dusky, SART Co-Chair and UF/IFAS Assoc. Dean , with Mr. Charlie Craig, Director of Emergency Management, Volusia County.
"Why do we have these meetings? During an emergency is not the time to be introducing yourself, exchanging business cards and asking for favors. No single Agency can respond to every emergency on its own. We must share our resources."
Dr. Joan Dusky, UF/IFAS
Florida SART Co-Chair
Of course, we have to qualify the headline… Greatest SART Meeting ever? Of all time? National, or just Florida? The 2013 Planning Meeting in Daytona Beach January 28-30 was an astonishingly successful meeting based on attendance, questions and discussions, interaction and enthusiastic feedback from the 150+ participants.
The 2013 SART meeting followed three successful planning meetings which truly established the agenda and ground rules: 2007 in St. Petersburg Beach, 2009 in Cocoa Beach and 2011 in Altamonte Springs. Here are a few highlights:
Tuesday: The Small Animal Emergency Sheltering Course
Led by Consie von Gontard, master instructors from the Florida State Animal Response Coalition (SARC: www.flsarc.org) taught Small Animal Emergency Sheltering on Tuesday afternoon.
“I believe about 30 people completed the course,” von Gontard said. “It was an interesting and entertaining crowd … not the normal group of individuals and animal welfare activists. We had lots of people from county emergency management departments and some from extension as well. That made the questions and scenarios we discussed a bit different and that was good for everyone.
 |
 |
"Then when we went down to the beach for the final exercise – uniforms instead of bathing suits! – everyone got into the spirit and we had superior participation."
Stephen Barineau, Fernando Alzugaray and Amy Cepero lead SART's registration team.
"The 2013 SART Planning Meeting was a labor of love for me. The meeting seemed to always be forever away while we were organizing, talking with our partners, and arranging all the logistics. Then suddenly the time arrives, and no matter how much you have prepared, there are a million things to do. It was my first time being the chief organizer and point of contact for an event such as this, but overall I think it turned out excellent. We received nothing but positive feedback from the attendees about the location, the presentations, the setup, and we are even taking credit for the weather that week. We had to put out some small fires here and there that you can't avoid, but we never did have any of the big issues we had prepared to face. I made some mental notes of things I can arrange better for the next Planning Meeting, but as a whole it went terrific. I am really appreciative to all our attendees, presenters, contributors, and the hotel staff that I worked with to make this meeting a huge success."
Stephen Barineau
S.A.R.T. Planner
ESF-17, Division of Animal Industry
Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services
“We have a common mission to safeguard animals – cats to cows.”
Dr. Thomas Holt, Florida State Veterinarian
Director, FDACS/DAI
[top]
Eight SART Members Recognized
for Above & Beyond Contributions To SART Objectives
Eight Floridians from county, state and federal levels of responsibility were recognized at the 2013 Planning Meeting for their continuing contributions to the development and enhancement of the SART program: "In recognition of Exceptional Service to the State Agricultural Response Team and the State of Florida in Emergency Planning and Operations."  They were (left-to-right): Colin Hall accepting for Dee Thompson, Okaloosa County Animal Services; Paul Studivant, St. Johns County Animal Control; Jamie Willoughby, Madison County Animal Control; Melinda Springer, USDA/APHIS/VS; John Court, FDACS-DAI; Dr. Cynda Crawford, UF College of Veterinary Medicine; and Consie von Gontard, Florida SARC. Not present: Dr. Kendra Stauffer, USDA/APHIS/VS. |
[top]
Ten Moments
The SART 2013 Planning Meeting in Pictures & Words
The 2013 Florida SART Planning Meeting opened with a welcome from Charlie Craig, Volusia County Emergency Management Director. After Dr. Joan Dusky, SART Chairperson called the meeting to order, Adam Putnam, Commissioner of the Florida Department of Agriculture & Consumer Services made a special, video-taped address. Then Bryan Koon, Director, Florida Division of Emergency Management discussed current issues in agriculture and emergency response. Overall, the Planning Meeting was a non-stop two-day event in an atmosphere of cooperation, sharing and learning. |
 Bryan Koon, |
 | Dr. Greg Christy, FDACS/DAI (right) and Dr. George Chambless, USDA/APHIS: Christy’s presentation reviewed the 2012 Screw Worm Exercise, “Operation Red Fly.” Chambless moderated a panel discussion about the USDA – “Part of the SART Team.” |
 | Dr. Jeanie Lin (left) and Kim Duffiney, both of USDA/APHIS/AC, participated in the Monday afternoon panel discussion about the role and responsibilities of our federal partner, the USDA. |
  | Dr. Jenifer Chatfield and Art Johnstone presented the course on "Sharing Information and Intelligence Related to Food and Transportation" on Tuesday. |
 | Dr. Diane Kitchen, FDACS/DAI, discussing "Foreign Animal Disease Awareness." In any animal disease outbreak, responders are critical in assessing, coordinating and assisting. Animal Disease Response Training is critical to minimize the effects of an outbreak. |
 Small group discussions and exercises are vital to bringing information from "the cloud" to a hands-on awareness that emergencies can happen anywhere, any time and that the most effective initial response begins locally. Pictured are (left-right): Dr. Terry Clekis, Craig Dopp, Jim DeValerio and Robert Kluson. | |
 | Melinda Springer and James Timmons. Springer, USDA/APHIS/VS, reviewed MIM – Mobile Information Management – and its applicability to emergency situations involving animals. Florida successfully piloted a bar code animal tracking system in 2012. |
 | ESF-17 Joe Kight, FDACS/DAI, discusses emergency response with Lisa Pederson, Extension Beef Quality Assurance Specialist at North Dakota State University. "Tracking animals in an emergency, when you are inundated by dozens or hundreds of animals, is a problem," Kight says. "We've had the MIM hardware for some time but now the software needs to catch up." |
 | Two proud SART award recipients: at left Consie von Gontard, SARC, and at right Dr. Cynda Crawford, UF College of Veterinary Medicine. |
 | Lisa Pederson, NDSU, with John Court, FDACS/DAI. Pederson’s presentation on Bovine Emergency Response – to vehicle crashes involving transported cattle – was both pointed and remarkably well-received by the Wednesday morning attendees. “The accident scene is not the place to build your team,” she says. |
 | Unfortunately for Max Sharpe and Michele Fox, representing Palm Beach County Animal Care & Control at the 2013 SART Planning Meeting, the wind was gusting on the final day making the beach uncomfortable, but not too bad for a coffee break. |
“In an emergency, it’s important to stop, evaluate and get a plan. We often find that the first thing people do in an emergency is rush to the side of animals to give them comfort. This may not always help the animal, may not be what they really need, and it can put the people themselves in danger.”
Dr. Kendra Stauffer, USDA/APHIS/VS
NOTE: Watch for additional photos, interviews and news items from the 2013 Florida SART Planning Meeting in the March 2013 issue of the SART Sentinel.
[top]
Under the Radar
Florida SARC/SART Course Receives National Recognition
 |
Good news about the Small Animal Emergency Sheltering course developed by SART and SARC: “The Small Animal Sheltering Course is now added to the catalog. The course code is FL-003-RESP,” writes Maurice Haynes, DHS Training Coordinator, Bureau of Preparedness, Training & Exercise Unit, Florida Division of Emergency Management maurice.haynes@em.myflorida.com.
The Small Animal Course joins FL-002-RESP “Large Animal Technical Rescue” https://www.firstrespondertraining.gov/catalog.do?a=state_federal on the federally approved list of courses.
Please Verify Your SART Contact Information
It’s a new year, but significant threats to animals and agriculture remain. Your loved ones, your friends, neighbors and the SART mission depend on accurate contact and identification information during an emergency. Please do everyone – including yourself – a huge favor and verify and/or update your personal information at http://www.flsart.org/SART/ajaxviewmember?pageID=0.
SART Training & Equipment: Cow Rescued From River
 |
 |
 |
 |
On Saturday February 9, Lee County Sheriff's Office Agricultural Crimes Unit Deputies Gary Clark and Matt Faulk responded to a call for assistance from a local rancher, Mr. Shane Parker. The rancher said one of his cows was stuck in the mud in the Orange River and that he had tried to rescue it himself but was unsuccessful.
Deputies Clark and Faulk deployed the new livestock rescue trailer and utilized mechanical advantage rope systems as well as the rescue glide (photos above) to pull the cow from the river, much to the appreciation of the rancher.
[Editor’s Note: Deputy Matt Faulk’s email ends with this wonderful signature statement: “An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.” Benjamin Franklin]
Submitted by
Deputy 1st Class Matt Faulk
Lee County Sheriff's Office
Agricultural Crimes Unit
Bringing Back the Chestnut
 |
Extinct may not be forever. The American chestnut was once the most important food and timber tree species in the Eastern hardwood forest. It was almost completely destroyed by a bark fungus accidentally introduced from the Orient in 1904. Within 40 years, more than 30 million acres of chestnut trees were killed from Maine to Georgia and west to the Mississippi. This tragedy was one of the greatest ecological disasters in American history.
The chestnut was an amazingly useful tree: its plentiful nuts were eaten by people and wildlife; its beautiful, rot-resistant lumber was used for everything from furniture to fence posts; and its tannin was used in the tanning industry. The loss of the chestnut, at the time of the Great Depression, had a devastating effect on the people and wildlife of the Appalachian Mountains. The economic loss from the chestnut's demise amounted to untold millions of dollars.
Chestnut Hill Tree Farm www.chestnuthilltreefarm.com in Alachua, Florida is now producing Dunstan chestnuts. These trees are the most widely planted chestnuts in America, and are proven blight resistant and to bear the best quality nuts by commercial orchardists all over the U.S. for the past 30 years.
Chestnut Hill Tree Farm was founded by R. D. Wallace, grandson of internationally recognized plant breeder Dr. Robert T. Dunstan, and son of Dr. A.T. Wallace, former plant geneticist and Dean of Agricultural Research at the University of Florida. Wallace founded Chestnut Hill Tree Farm in 1981 to propagate Dunstan chestnut trees and is one of the primary persons responsible for establishing the American chestnut orchard industry. Over the last 30 years, Chestnut Hill says it has produced enough trees to cover 500,000 acres with new forest.
Lipman … who?
 |
Lipman (www.lipmanproduce.com) is the largest open-field tomato producer in North America, but the company also produces peppers, cucumbers, eggplant, hard squash, green beans and sweet corn. While the majority of acres are based in Florida, other farms are located in South Carolina, Virginia and California. The company also has deals with associated growers in Tennessee and North Carolina.
“We know from our customers that their big thing is dependability,” says CEO Kent Shoemaker. “Dependability means flavor, quality, seasonality and food safety.”
If you have never heard of this major ag company, it is a good idea to check out a January 18, 2013 story by Frank Giles in Growing Produce titled “Lipman Gears for Growth in Challenged Tomato Market: Strategic moves in the past year put South Florida vegetable farming operation on a path of sustained success.” http://www.growingproduce.com/article/32601/lipman-gears-for-growth-in-challenged-tomato-market
On the 8th Day …
Homage to hard work on the land and with the animals that provide our clothes
and food. And noticing, respectfully, how times change…
And on the 8th day God looked down on his planned paradise and said, “I need a caretaker!” So, God made a farmer.
God said, “I need somebody to get up before dawn and milk cows and work all day in the fields, milk cows again, eat supper and then go to town and stay past midnight at a meeting of the school board.” So, God made a farmer!
“I need somebody with strong arms. Strong enough to rustle a calf, yet gentle enough to deliver his own grandchild. Somebody to call hogs, tame cantankerous machinery, come home hungry and have to wait for lunch until his wife is done feeding and visiting with the ladies and telling them to be sure to come back real soon ... and mean it.” So, God made a farmer!
God said, “I need somebody that can shape an ax handle, shoe a horse with a hunk of car tire make a harness out of hay wire, feed sacks and shoe scraps. And who, at planting time and harvest season, will finish his forty hour week by Tuesday noon. Then, paining from ‘tractor back,’ put in another seventy two hours.” So, God made a farmer!
God had to have somebody willing to ride the ruts at double speed to get the hay in ahead of the rain clouds and yet stop on mid-field and race to help when he sees the first smoke from a neighbor's place. So, God made a farmer!
God said, “I need somebody strong enough to clear trees, heave bails and yet gentle enough to tame lambs and wean pigs and tend the pink combed pullets ... and who will stop his mower for an hour to mend the broken leg of a meadow lark.” So, God made a farmer!
It had to be somebody who'd plow deep and straight ... and not cut corners. Somebody to seed and weed, feed and breed ... and rake and disc and plow and plant and tie the fleece and strain the milk. Somebody to replenish the self feeder and then finish a hard day’s work with a five mile drive to church. Somebody who’d bale a family together with the soft strong bonds of sharing, who’d laugh and then sigh ... and then respond with smiling eyes, when his son says he wants to spend his life “doing what dad does.” So, God made a farmer!
(Author Unknown)
FWC Unveils Plans to Conserve Species
 |
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, a SART partner agency, has posted draft action plans to conserve 23 species of native wildlife and wants the public to weigh in by reviewing them online.
Those reading the plans for animals familiar and not so familiar – such as the osprey, Everglades mink, Pine Barrens treefrog and reddish egret – will learn about the species’ biological backgrounds and habitats.
After reviewing the individual action plans at MyFWC.com/Imperiled, people can comment on what is proposed in the scientific material to conserve each animal. The comment period on these plans continues through March 13. (Diane Hirth, 850-410-5291)
[top]
About the SART Sentinel |
The SART Sentinel is an e-mail newsletter prepared monthly by the members of the Florida State Agricultural Response Team. Past issues of the Sentinel are archived on the Florida SART Web Site www.flsart.org. If you have a story or photo that you would like to have considered for publication in the SART Sentinel, please contact the editors. Editor: Rick Sapp, PhD, Technical Writer, under contract with the Florida Department of Agriculture & Consumer Services, Division of Animal Industry rsa5@cox.net Associate Editor: Joe Kight, State ESF-17 Coordinator, Florida Department of Agriculture & Consumer Services, Division of Animal Industry Joe.Kight@freshfromflorida.com [top] |
|
|