Nebraska
Nebraska-developed wheat variety to address new fungal threat
In the wake of heightened wheat concern in the Nebraska Panhandle in 2023, this year brings positive news: The University of Nebraska–Lincoln is releasing a new wheat variety, NE Prism CLP, that stands out for its resistance to fungal disease, including fusarium head blight.
Last spring, Husker faculty members Katherine Frels and Stephen Wegulo began receiving concerned phone calls from Nebraska wheat growers. Something strange, the callers said, was going on in wheat fields in parts of the Panhandle.
The farmers were seeing field conditions they hadn’t encountered before: Their winter wheat had reached maturity, but the kernels had none of their familiar golden color and robust appearance. Instead, they were bleached and sickly.
Tombstones, such kernels are called — blighted irreparably by fungal assault.
The culprit was fusarium head blight, a notoriously destructive plant disease rarely seen in western Nebraska. The disease, also known as scab, undercuts yield and contaminates the grain with mycotoxins harmful to humans and animals.
“Producers were caught off-guard,” said Frels, Nebraska’s small grains breeder and an assistant professor of agronomy and horticulture.
The Panhandle region, which produces more than half of the state’s wheat, is normally free of the disease because that part of the state rarely receives enough rain to trigger the release of harmful fungal spores during wheat flowering.
But 2023 was not a normal year.
While drought kept a tight grip on much of eastern Nebraska last year, the Panhandle received above-average rainfall before and during wheat flowering, and the moisture enabled a rare outbreak of fusarium head blight. Wheat-producing areas in Kansas and Colorado were similarly affected.
“If there is a lot of rain two to three weeks before flowering and that rain is consistent into the flowering period for wheat, we know that the risk for fusarium head blight is pretty high,” said Wegulo, professor of plant pathology.
Wegulo, who is also a plant pathologist for Nebraska Extension, does extensive surveys of Nebraska wheat field conditions each spring and provides regular updates in CropWatch.
The new wheat variety, a two-gene Clearfield package, is available through NU Horizons Genetics and will be a key topic for Husker representatives when they meet with producers during the annual wheat field days in June.
Nebraska producers had requested a new Clearfield variety, and the university responded after extensive field testing, Frels said. The variety “has some other good things in the disease package, like some stripe rust resistance and stem rust resistance,” she said. “That’s what our growers expect from us.”
Fusarium head blight is best addressed though a two-pronged approach, using a crop variety with genetic resistance supplemented by appropriately timed fungicide application.
“For growers, you really can’t see it until it’s too late to do anything,” Frels said. “That’s why we want to have at least that moderate resistance out, and then ideally if the environment is right, we recommend that growers also spray fungicides to have the best chance of highly reducing the risk.”
Producers can benefit by regularly monitoring conditions through a widely used online fusarium risk tool, Frels and Wegulo said.
Wegulo and research technologist Julie Stevens carry out extensive testing on potential new wheat lines in the university’s breeding program, checking for resistance to three diseases (stem rust, leaf rust and fusarium head blight). Partner labs elsewhere in the country check for additional diseases before any new variety can move forward for consideration.
“We give that data to Katherine, and she will use that data to select her lines, looking at the level of disease resistance and other agronomic qualities,” Wegulo said. “We try to identify wheat varieties with resistance and then combine the resistance with fungicide application and determine the amount of disease control you get.”
The university’s efforts benefit greatly from the federal funding provided by the U.S. Wheat and Barley Scab Initiative, which promotes research to develop innovative approaches to address fusarium head blight. Some farm-state lawmakers, pointing to the value of the research, have called for the program’s funding to be increased as part of the next farm bill.
Wegulo is giving a presentation at an international conference in Athens, Greece, this summer on how climate change influences fusarium head blight.
“With climate change, we’re seeing this shift toward more intense precipitation in places where we traditionally have not seen it,” he said.
That was the case in Nebraska in 2023, as the rainfall amount in the Panhandle exceeded the norm.
“We cannot rule out that we are probably going to see fusarium head blight in the west more frequently than in the past,” Wegulo said.
Nebraska
Former Nebraska wrestler AJ Ferrari wanted in Lincoln, accused of assaulting pregnant woman
LINCOLN, Neb. (KOLN) – Former Nebraska wrestler AJ Ferrari is wanted in Lancaster County on suspicion of assaulting a pregnant woman in May.
An arrest warrant was filed for Ferrari on Thursday. He faces three felony charges which include first-degree false imprisonment and assault by strangling a pregnant woman.
According to an arrest affidavit, a woman from California contacted police in Lincoln on May 8 just after midnight. She told officers her daughter called for help and pointed them to Ferrari’s apartment.
Police arrived at the apartment and knocked on the door. A pregnant woman came out after several minutes of knocking with no answer. Officers said the woman was visibly upset.
She told officers that Ferrari tried taking her phone away after an argument, but she wouldn’t let him take it. The arrest affidavit shows Ferrari then dragged her off a bed by her feet.
Police think Ferrari then got on top of her and strangled her, likely until she was unconscious. The woman told police that she felt as though her throat “collapsed” and that she was “breathing through a straw.”
Once regaining consciousness, police said the woman tried hiding in a closet and contacting her mother on another device. But Ferrari followed her, pushed her onto a bed and sat on her until she apologized, according to the affidavit.
She apologized in order to be released, police said. The woman then tried to leave the apartment, but police said Ferrari dragged her by the arm back inside. She found her phone and contacted her mother, yelling “help!”, prosecutors wrote.
Ferrari grabbed the phone and hung up, according to the affidavit. The woman’s mother tried calling several more times before calling police.
Authorities transported the woman to Bryan West for treatment. Officers said she sustained injuries consistent with strangulation, including bruising around her neck and other abrasions.
Last weekend, Ferrari was arrested in Lincoln County on suspicion of flight to avoid arrest, willful reckless driving and obstructing the police. He was cited after a trooper chased a Corvette in the North Platte area.
Lincoln County authorities told KOLN that Ferrari is out on bond. His current whereabouts are unclear.
Court records show that the woman has filed for a protection order against Ferrari. A hearing has been set for July 7 to give him an opportunity to show the court why one should not be issued.
Previously, Ferrari was booked in Lancaster County, Nebraska for an outstanding warrant in January of this year, but those charges were dismissed later that week.
Ferrari parted ways with the Huskers in April of this year.
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Copyright 2026 KOLN. All rights reserved.
The Nebraska State Fair is celebrating America’s 250th anniversary with a special 72-hour flash sale on Season Passes.
From July 3 through July 5, fans can purchase a 2026 Season Pass for just $50—a significant discount from its regular value of $132.
The pass includes one admission per day for all 11 days of the 2026 Nebraska State Fair, making it ideal for visitors who plan to attend multiple days.
Fair officials say the promotion is one of the biggest Season Pass discounts offered in years and will not be extended.
After July 5, Season Passes will remain available at a higher discounted price.
OMAHA, Neb. (WOWT) – Legalizing online sports betting has met with resistance in the Nebraska Legislature for years.
Tax Relief Nebraska, a group backed by Nebraska casinos and online sports betting groups, took the issue to the people of the state through a petition drive.
Those petitions are now in, and casino officials say they expect to have enough signatures to make the November ballot — but also expect pushback through Election Day.
The case for online betting
Currently, legal sports bets cannot be placed on a phone in Nebraska. Casino operators say people who choose to wager are finding other ways to do it.
“They’re just doing it illegally through a virtual private network, or they’re driving over to the first exit between Iowa and Nebraska, placing a bet and then driving back to their home,” said Lynne McNally of Warhorse Casino.
Nebraska casino operators say the state has already collected millions of dollars in state taxes and property tax relief from casino gambling, and that online sports betting would add to that total.
A majority of Nebraskans voted for casino gambling to enter the state in 2020, and casino operators expect similar support if the online betting petition makes the November ballot.
“As you know, we got 65% on the constitutional amendment and actually got nearly 70% on the tax portion of the statute when the casinos were legalized in 2020. I think that we’ll be in that area, if not maybe a little higher than that,” McNally said.
“There’s always going to be a sector of the public that doesn’t want to gamble. They don’t want to go to our facilities and that’s just fine. I guess I have an objection with trying to tell other people what to do,” McNally said.
The opposition
The Nebraska Family Alliance stands against online gambling and plans to campaign against the initiative across the state. The nonprofit group issued a statement that reads in part: “Online sports betting has been a massive public policy failure that benefits national sportsbooks at the expense of kids, student-athletes, families and businesses. While they have more money, they don’t have the truth.”
Pat Loontjer, director of Gambling with the Good Life, has opposed expanded gambling in Nebraska for 30 years.
“They’re telling the same lie — property tax relief. Well in Nebraska you say property tax relief and everybody says where do I sign,” Loontjer said.
Loontjer also raised concerns about the impact on young people.
“Sports betting on the phone is the most addictive thing for young people, young men especially. You’ve got kids that are going to lose their scholarships, lose their future,” Loontjer said.
What comes next
If enough signatures are verified and the issue is placed on the November ballot, Warhorse Casino officials say Nebraskans could be able to make sports bets on their phones by spring of next year.
Copyright 2026 WOWT. All rights reserved.
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