This past week about 30 new faculty and staff in UNL's Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources traveled across the state as part of the IANR Roads Scholar Tour. They visited UNL research and extension facilities as well as businesses and some of the state's natural wonders.

       The IANR Roads Scholar Tour, first held in 2008, is a way for new IANR faculty and staff to see and experience the west central, Panhandle, and Sandhills areas. The tour introduced innovative Nebraskans and Nebraska businesses as well as university research and extension facilities.

       Along the way, the tour visited

• the UNL West Central Research and Extension Center at North Platte, where IANR faculty discussed research in beef, irrigation, weeds, horticulture, plant disease, and forages. They also viewed the new wind tunnel designed to research pesticide drift;
• Lake McConaughy and the Visitors Center there where they viewed an interactive display showcasing Nebraska-led innovations in irrigated crop production;
• at Gering, the Legacy of the Plains Museum, formerly the Farm and Ranch Museum;
• Panhandle Research and Extension Center at Scottsbluff where they viewed greenhouse research, field plots and feedlots, and projects related to 4-H and family and consumer sciences;
• Western Sugar Cooperative where they toured the production facility;
• Scotts Bluff National Monument and the Wildcat Hills State Park near Gering;
• Gudmundsen Sandhills Laboratory near Whitman, where they learned about subirrigated meadow, rangeland, and grazing studies, and May calving; and
• Miletta Vista Winery, north of St. Paul, one of Nebraska's growing entrepreneurial ag industries.