We said goodbye to longtime APG professors and researchers Craig Sheaffer and Roger Becker, who hung up their professorial hats at the end of the year. Read on to learn more about their decades of work at the University of Minnesota.
CRAIG SHEAFFER ended his long career at the University ofMinnesota in December. He wrote about his education and workover nearly 50 years at the U:
I grew up near Hershey, Pennsylvania, and went to undergraduate school at Delaware Valley College, in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, and then graduate school at theUniversity of Maryland in College Park. There, I did research on hay preservatives, pasture renovation, sewage sludge application to crops, and sunflowers for silage. I was given a lot of flexibility to work on a diversity of projects, and I took advantage of it. The directions of my career were influenced by my interest in plant morphology and physiology. I perhaps could have become a chicken farmer because my folks had a large flock, but processing chicken for meat was a revoltingbusiness so I steered away from poultry. I also had greatexperiences as an undergraduate working on dairyfarms. I liked milking and feeding cattle but not gettingup at 5 a.m.
After I received my PhD, I was able to move directly intoa faculty position because postdoc positions were rare. Minnesota had the best forage team in the United States, and I felt very welcomed here. The late Herb Johnson, the department head when I came, was a good recruiter and promoter of the department. He was old school and ran a tight ship but provided a great opportunity for me to succeed.
My career as a researcher and teacher at the University of Minnesota began in July 1977. I have witnessed many changes, as these years have flown by. Many of these transitions in this work have been around computer technology that has increased the efficiency of writing, data analysis, and certain aspects of teaching. For teaching, overhead projectors, chalkboards, and 2-by-2 slides have been replaced by PowerPoint. I also saw the expansion of our department’s facilities through the addition of Borlaug Hall; that increased our research and teaching capacity.
One of the biggest changes that occurred was around funding for research and education. As a new faculty member, I had support for travel, operation, technical assistance, and graduate students. But over time,governmental financial support dwindled, and by the end of my research and teaching career, I depended on outside support obtained through grant writing. Grant writing certainly provided opportunities to expand my programs into new areas but produced a never-ending cycle of competition for funds.
I am thankful to have worked with many remarkable individuals during my career, including the late Don Barnes along with Gordon Marten and Neal Martin, who provided significant mentorship as I developed my forage research project. The hours I spent on Minnesota roads with Neal Martin going to just about every county in the state provided a unique opportunity to learn about our state’s forage industry and its growers. The late Larry Smith, Vern Cardwell, and Steve Simmons provided inspiration for teaching. Finally, I want to extend special thanks to Jim Halgerson, Doug Swanson, Josh Larson, and Kris Moncada for the technical support, hard work, and camaraderie that enabled me to complete my research and teaching objectives.
For the greater part of my career, I had responsibility for both research and teaching. In my research, which was often cooperative with other faculty, I contributed data and decision support tools to enhance producer decision making on management of alfalfa and forage grasses. Working with plant breeders, I also had the opportunity to evaluate variety and germplasm response to management and the environment. I was among the first to conduct research on organic production systems, which resulted in the online decision support tool and, most important, long-term relations with organic growers. Most recently, through support of the Forever Green Initiative led by my long-term colleague, the late Don Wyse, I conducted research on Kernza, a perennial grain providing both economic and environmental benefit.
My transition to retirement was facilitated by a phasedretirement, and I was able to work in forage extension education to transfer my research results to producers and decisions makers. I greatly appreciate how how producers and consultants have a thirst for new knowledge and I was happy to support them through my education program and research.
In evaluating my career, I feel that my greatest satisfaction came from teaching and mentoring undergraduate and graduate students. I hope in someway that I made an impact on their education and careers.It is said that the legacy of a teacher never ends as it is passed from generation to generation. Perhaps at some time in the future, a former student will remember me in teaching another generation of students.
After more than 50 years in academia as a student and faculty member, I embark on a new journey. I am excited about taking the first steps into an unknown phase of my life. I can’t wonder where I am bound, but I feel an incredible lightness of being! So long!
ROGER BECKER retired on December 31, after nearly four decades as an Extension agronomist, weed scientist, and professor at the University of Minnesota.
Becker was schooled in Extension long before he landed a career working in it. Growing up on a diversified livestock and grain farm in southwest Iowa, he was well-acquainted with the Extension program in the state. The local county agent visited his family’s farm regularly and Becker was involved in 4-H, the youth-development program administered by the Cooperative Extension System and USDA. Becker’s time in 4-H included leadership training (he was president of his county youth council) and a lot of fun, he said.
Weed science, however, was not on his radar when he considered life after high school.
Initially, Becker entertained joining the U.S. Air Force and was nominated to the Air Force Academy his senior year; but ultimately, he decided against a military career. It was the early ’70s, the Vietnam War was “going south,” and perhaps most important, he said, he was prone to air sickness. When his high school counselor asked him what he was going to do, he said he was sure he did not want to milk cows for a living. The counselor suggested studying agronomy, an area of study Becker had never heard of. “It has something to do with plants and soil,” the counselor said. “You might like it.”
Come fall, Becker decided to give it a try and joined all the other college-bound kids from his school at Iowa State University (ISU) in Ames.
Experience on a soybean internship with ISU professor Walter Fehr during his sophomore year, coupled with a chance meeting with a guy who worked in data management at Monsanto in St. Louis, led him to an internship after graduation at the agrochemical corporation. His supervisor during that six-month stint was weed scientist Louis Meyers. Soon, with Meyers’ help, Becker was in graduate school at ISU working under David Staniforth, a pioneer in the field of weed science. He later worked as an Extension associate with Vivian Jennings and Dick Fawcett, Extension weed scientists at ISU at that time. With the connections made during his internship at Monsanto, Becker joined the company after graduation, but the Extension vibe soon came calling.
In 1987, Becker was hired at the University ofMinnesota, where he wore a number of hats over the next 37 years.
His early work focused on weed management in forage and pastures and on ground and surface water contamination from pesticides. Later, he worked on weed control for sweetcorn and processing pea producers. Becker began working with the Minnesota Department of Agriculture and the Department of Natural Resources to manage purple loose strife when it was added to the noxious weeds list. That work led him to work in biocontrol in non-cropland and natural areas and working with regulatory communities. He was instrumental in the biocontrol of invasive weed species since then.
In November, a month before his retirement, Becker received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Minnesota Invasive Species Advisory Council (MISAC), a group that holds a common interest in managing and preventing the spread of invasive species in Minnesota.
The award cited Becker for his years of leadership on invasive plant issues and the research he conducted.“ He is key in bringing invasive species management advice and herbicide recommendations to practitioners,” the award says. “Roger’s work has provided foundational scientific information for recommendations for management activities, including both herbicide and biocontrol management techniques. Roger’s passion for the field is evident, and he is great at sharing his enthusiasm for the subject with others. As a professor he has mentored students in the fields of invasive species and weed management. He has worked on a wide range of invasive plants, including purple loosestrife, common buckthorn, garlic mustard, Canada thistle, andJapanese knotweed.
“Roger conducted research that directly led to better invasive plant management. His recent research on knotweed management is one example. He conducted herbicide trials and examined how knotweeds handle carbohydrate resources in response to treatment. This research directly resulted in updating management recommendations in outreach materials. Throughout his career, Roger has generously shared his extensive knowledge and experience about noxious and invasive plant management with educators, researchers, the public, land managers, and policy makers.”
When looking back at his time at the U, Becker said working in Extension was a highlight. Despite diminished funding for it over the last four decades, he sees it as still having a strong role in the country.
Extension is about educating the public, and its 4-H component is about leadership and development, said Becker. And those who work in Extension “are the best people,” he said. “Extension people tend to be effervescent and engaging. Some might be introverts at home, but they are universally extroverts in the public setting. They’re just fun, knowledgeable, engaging, inquisitive people.”
And in the weed science realm, he considers himself a “techno-optimist.” In an interview on a Minnesota Crop News podcast last summer, Becker said he sees some encouraging developments coming down the road. "There’s amazing things happening with artificial intelligence and robotics and AI and little robots that runaround,” he said. On the invasive side, “there are very interesting things happening with the CRISPR technology and some of the DNA technologies that could really move things [forward] like the classic biocontrol challenges that we face today. . . .
“It’ll be fun to sit on the deck and watch all this technology evolve, because I’m optimistic there’s going to be a lot of fun things happening that you and I never imagined.”
If you want to “go into the weeds” and learn more about Becker’s work, check out the Minnesota Crop News podcast from August 2024. Dave Nicolai and Seth Naeve chat with Becker about his varied career and the impactshe has made in agriculture.—Kristal Leebrick