Classified advertising is a form of advertising which is particularly common in newspapers and other periodicals. A free ads paper is a newspaper containing only classified ads, usually grouped into an extensive set of categories.

Classified advertising is usually textually based and can consist of as little as the type of item being sold, (i.e., "Clothing") and a telephone number to call for more information ("call 555-7777"). It can also have much more detail, such as name to contact, address to contact or visit, a detailed description of the product or products ("pants and sweaters, size 10" as opposed to "clothing", "red 1996 Pontiac Grand Prix" as opposed to "automobile"). There are generally no pictures or other graphics within the advertisement, although sometimes a logo may be used. Classified advertising is called such because it is generally grouped within the publication under headings classifying the product or service being offered (headings such as Accounting, Automobiles, Clothing, Farm Produce, For Sale, For Rent, etc.) and is grouped entirely in a distinct section of the periodical, which makes it distinct from display advertising, which often contains graphics or other art work and which is more typically distributed throughout a publication adjacent to editorial content. A hybrid of the two forms — classified display advertising — may often be found, in which categorized advertisements with larger amounts of graphical detail can be found among the text listings of a classified advertising section in a publication. Business opportunities often use classifieds to sell their services, usually employing 1-800 numbers. Classified ads are also among the tools used by many companies in recruitment for available job opportunities.

In recent years the term "classified advertising" or "classified ads" has expanded from merely the sense of print advertisements in periodicals to include similar types of advertising on computer services, radio, and even television, particularly cable television but occasionally broadcast television as well, typically very early in the morning hours.

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USDA Agricultural Research Service

Fruit Fly Diversity Is in the Details
Fri, 16 May 2008 10:22:00 -0500
While fruit flies and plant diversity have co-evolved in the neotropics, new research shows geography and other factors also play an important role in generating insect diversity. Photo courtesy of Marty Condon, Cornell College. How to catch a fruit fly   Fruit flies and honey bees   Sorting out leafminers Fruit Fly Diversity Is in the Details By Ann Perry May 16, 2008 Many scientists attribute the diversity of plant-feeding insects to plant diversity and to the many ways insects can survive on host plants. An article published this week in Science explores how these niches are used by one group of insects—and also examines evidence that using niche diversity alone to estimate species diversity can result in an undercount. The authors conclude that for this insect group, diversity is greater than the sum of plant parts. Molecular biologist Sonja Scheffer, in the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) Systematic Entomology Laboratory in Beltsville, Md., teamed up with three colleagues to study the ecological links between tropical fruit flies in the Blepharoneura genus and their host plants. The other researchers were Marty Condon, a biology professor at Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa; ARS support scientist Matthew Lewis, and Susan Swenson, a biology professor at New York’s Ithaca College. Blepharoneura fly larvae feed within the flowers or fruits of plants in the cucumber family. For their study, the researchers collected and raised 2,857 different Blepharoneura specimens from 24 neotropical host plant species. DNA analysis indicated there were at least 52 distinct species in the collection. The researchers found that only one of the fruit fly species they raised ate two kinds of plant parts—seeds and flowers. All the others ate only one or the other, and many of the flower-eaters were so specialized that they ate only male or only female flowers. Most of the fly species were associated with only one host plant species. On the other hand, many of the plants hosted a range of species. One plant species supported at least 13 species of the fruit flies. Location also played a role in the findings. Some of the fly species were geographically widespread. But others could only be found within a limited geographic range, even though the range of the host plant was much more extensive. The team concluded that host plant and niche diversity plays a significant role in the extraordinary diversity of Blepharoneura flies. But geographical factors—and the passage of time—may play an even greater role. ARS is the U.S. Department of Agriculture's chief scientific research agency.
Making Bee Hives Cleaner
Wed, 14 May 2008 08:57:00 -0500
Ozone may make hives safer for honey bees by breaking down pesticide residues and killing certain insect and disease pests. Photo courtesy of David Cappaert, Michigan State University, Bugwood.org. Compound quells bee-killing chalkbrood   MegaBee nourishes honey bees   Colony collapse disorder research plan announced Ozone Might Help Make Bee Hives Cleaner and Safer By Marcia Wood May 14, 2008 Ozone, which is already used to sanitize drinking water and swimming pools, might help make hives cleaner and safer for America's beleaguered honey bees. That's according to results from preliminary laboratory tests by Agricultural Research Service (ARS) entomologist Rosalind R. James. She leads the agency's Pollinating Insects Biology, Management and Systematics Research Unit at Logan, Utah. James tested ozone's effects on two pesticides, coumophos and tau-fluvalinate, both widely used by beekeepers to control varroa mites, a major enemy of bees. Studies elsewhere indicate that residues of these chemicals can accumulate in hives, including in the honeycomb. Beekeepers typically reuse the honeycomb after the honey has been extracted. For the experiment, she placed glass vials of the pesticides in a small, tightly sealed chamber, then exposed the chemicals to a flow of ozone gas. Keeping the chamber at 50 percent relative humidity, she tested different temperatures and different ozone and pesticide concentrations. Applying 500 parts per million of ozone in an approximately 93 degree Fahrenheit chamber for 10 to 15 hours degraded low concentrations of both pesticides, but 20 hours were needed to break down higher concentrations of tau-fluvalinate. James also looked at ozone's ability to zap the greater wax moth, a honeycomb pest, in all of its life stages, from egg to adult. Wax moths attack bee young and damage the honeycomb. Young wax moth larvae and adults were killed by just a few hours of ozone exposure. However, eggs, the most resistant life stage, had to be exposed to the gas for a few days. Further tests are needed to find out whether the breakdown products of the degraded pesticides pose a hazard to bees, James noted. In related work, James is finding that ozone can destroy microbes that cause major bee diseases such as chalkbrood and American foulbrood, but much higher ozone concentrations and longer fumigation times are needed. ARS, along with the National Honey Board, headquartered in Firestone, Colo., and O3Co., Inc., of Idaho Falls, Idaho, provided research support. ARS is the U.S. Department of Agriculture's chief scientific research agency.
Help for U.S. Sunflowers
Tue, 13 May 2008 08:47:00 -0500
Read the magazine story to find out more. Wild species of sunflowers collected in Australia by ARS scientists and their Australian collaborators may provide genes for better disease resistance in U.S. sunflower hybrids, which are the basis for a $300 million-a-year industry. Click the image for more information about it. Sunflowers resist downy mildew   Herbicide-tolerant sunflowers rooted in ARS research   Scientists search near and wide for sunflowers U.S. Sunflowers Could "Get a Lift" from Down Under By Jan Suszkiw May 13, 2008 Improved disease resistance could be in store for tomorrow's sunflower hybrids, thanks to plants that Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists collected in Australia last year and are now evaluating in greenhouse trials in Fargo, N.D. ARS plant pathologist Tom Gulya and botanist Gerald Seiler traveled to Australia in early 2007 in hopes of identifying new genes that could be incorporated into American sunflower hybrids for improved resistance to fungal diseases including downy mildew, rust and Sclerotinia stalk rot. Gulya considers stalk rot enough of an economic threat to the U.S. sunflower crop that incorporating even partial resistance from the Aussie plants would be worthwhile. He and Seiler, who are both in the ARS Sunflower Research Unit at Fargo, made the trip with funding from the ARS Plant Exchange Office. With the assistance of a team from the Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries (DPIF) in Queensland, Australia, Gulya and Seiler collected 59 populations of the wild sunflower species Helianthus annuus and H. debilis. In the fall of 2007, they began greenhouse trials to evaluate the plants' fungal disease resistance, as well as to analyze their seed oil content and fatty acid composition. A University of British Columbia collaborator will compare the plants' genetic profiles to those of American wild sunflowers. This could reveal whether the Aussie sunflowers have undergone significant genetic changes since arriving in the Land Down Under more than 100 years ago from America. Gulya and Seiler estimate their sunflower expedition took them on a journey of more than 6,200 miles through Western Australia, South Australia, New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland. On average, they and the DPIF team gathered 6,000 sunflower seeds per collection. This included plants from yards, hedgerows, municipal garbage dumps and other sites. Read more about the research in the May/June 2008 issue of Agricultural Research magazine. ARS is the U.S. Department of Agriculture's chief scientific research agency.

USDA - National Agricultural Statistics Service Reports

Cattle on Feed
U.S. Cattle on Feed Down 1 Percent....
Farm Labor
Hired Workers Down 7 Percent, Wage Rates up 4 Percent From a Year Ago....
Peanut Prices
Peanut prices received by farmers for all farmer stock peanuts averaged 19.5 cents per pound for the week ending May 10....
Crop Production
Winter Wheat Production Up 17 Percent from 2007. All Orange Production Unchanged From April....
Peanut Prices
Peanut prices received by farmers for all farmer stock peanuts averaged 20.0 cents per pound for the week ending May 3....
Weekly Weather and Crop Bulletin
NASS releases Weekly Weather and Crop Bulletin...

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