The Texas Wheat Producers Board presented the 2020 Texas Wheat County Agent of the Year award to Zach Davis, the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension agent for Hill County. Davis was recognized at the annual Texas County Agricultural Agents Association meeting on July 13 in Amarillo.
Hill County is the highest-producing county for winter wheat in the Blacklands. In the 2019 crop year, farmers planted 39,000 acres and harvested over 1.3 million bushels of wheat. To serve this vital growing region, Davis conducts variety trials for hard red winter wheat, soft red winter wheat, nitrogen application rates and fungicide for leaf rust. He also hosts educational programs focusing on a variety of topics, including marketing, insect control and weed management.
“County extension agents play an important role in educating wheat producers and providing them with the resources to increase their yields and efficiency,” said Rodney Mosier, Texas Wheat Producers executive vice president. “Davis is known for his consistent outreach to wheat producers in his county. His dedication to the wheat industry has been invaluable, not only to producers in Hill County, but throughout the area and state.”
Davis utilizes several mass media outlets, including a radio program that has reached 90,000 listeners, news articles in the local paper and a quarterly newsletter to enhance his educational outreach to producers in his area. He also showed adaptability when field days were cancelled in 2020 due to the coronavirus by scheduling online programs for producers.
Davis was nominated by Texas A&M AgriLife Regional Program Leader Brent Batchelor, who praised Davis’s hard work and dedication.
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