The Remington Nature Center’s Insect-O-Rama will feature a wide variety of insects and cuisine and education on the Zika virus. 

Shelly Cox is a naturalist with the Nature Center. Cox said the annual event on Saturday is for all ages and offers the opportunity to learn more about insects and spiders native to Missouri and their benefits. 

“We will have some ladies here with caterpillars in different stages of development,” Cox said. “We’ll have the health department here talking about some insects of concern like bed bugs and right now, of course, mosquitoes with all the Zika concern that’s going around.” 

Cox said there will also be an entomophagist, or insect chef, preparing some “insect cuisine” to sample. 

“They find insects in the field and they bring them in and they clean them, prepare them and fix them in different types of dishes,” Cox said. “So he might take, like, meal worms and put them in Rice Krispies treats. Or he might take stink bugs and sauté them in General Tso sauce and provide those. So he just fixes them in a variety of different ways and he’ll have them here for people to sample and try.” 

The Insect-O-Rama takes place from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. at the Remington Nature Center on Saturday. The event is included in the standard admission rates.

For more information, go to the Insect-O-Rama Facebook event page.

A 400 mile traveling event this month takes participants across the state of Kansas in search of treasure. 

The US Highway 36 Association has put on a “Treasure Hunt” for 11 years with over 30 towns participating from Elwood to St. Francis, Kansas. 

Christiane Cole is the Highway Association Marketing Coordinator and Secretary. Cole said back in 2005, the Highway 36 Association came up with the idea. 

“The Association decided that it needed an event or something to help boost the use of Highway 36 and to reflect on its history – it is 103 years old,” Cole said. “Highway 36 is a very important viaduct through six states and since we wanted to boost traffic we decided that one way to do it would be to have this Treasure Hunt which is garage sales, antique sales, estate sales, auctions, different towns do different things.” 

Cole said treasure hunters comes to Kansas from Louisiana, Minnesota, Oregon, Florida and other places around the country. 

“We started noticing they were arriving as early as Tuesday and starting on one end of the state and working their way across,” Cole said. “It is still advertised as a Friday, Saturday, Sunday event but we know that some antiquers and some shoppers do come into our state early. So, on the positive side, the travelers are here early enough in the week which means an economic impact which lingers throughout that week and beyond, so Kansas benefits from our travelers visiting us early.” 

Cole said the Treasure Hunt is a good event for any antique enthusiasts and bargain hunters. 

“We have a lot of antique stores in every county, all the towns,” Cole said. “We’ve had women who have called and said, ‘About four of us get together every year from Texas and we load up our truck and load up the trailer and we come up and have a grand old time.’” 

Cole said anyone wanting to join in the Treasure Hunt to set up a garage sale or other sale can contact their local chamber office. 

The 2016 Treasure Hunt takes place September 16 – 18. Maps and more can be found online on the Highway 36 website.

Spratt Memorial Stadium is ready for the first football game of the season after a ribbon cutting on Wednesday.

The grand opening of the new Craig Field at Spratt Stadium and the completed Victory Plaza at Missouri Western State University were celebrated with a St. Joseph Chamber of Commerce ribbon cutting ceremony.

Missouri Western Director of Athletics Kurt McGuffin spoke at the ceremony, giving a history of the stadium and all the work and support that went into the grand opening this week.

“You have to have the support of the city and the community,” McGuffin said. “The things that have happened out here wouldn’t have happened without so much help from our city, our county commissioners. This collaborative effort, I’m really proud of, that I haven’t seen very often at some of the schools I’ve been at but St. Joe takes this to heart and I think we’ve all got to be very, very proud of what’s happening (here).”

The over $7 million construction project began in May 2015. New at the stadium are a concourse, concessions area, restrooms, team store, club level, including suites, and press box. Repairs and improvements were made to the home grandstand seating. There is also new field turf, a 2,500 square foot video scoreboard and Victory Plaza. The plaza features a sculpture representing Missouri Western’s “Victory Tree” tradition. The piece was designed by Sara Hunt and fabricated by Hausman Metal Works and Roofing.

Missouri Western football opens the 2016 season at the new Spratt Stadium at 7 p.m. Thursday vs. the University of Nebraska-Kearney.

 

Police responded around 2:30 Wednesday morning to a call of shots fired in the 2900 block of Seneca Street. 

According to Captain Jeff Wilson with the St. Joseph Police Department, when officers arrived it was reported a white male subject entered the residence and displayed a handgun. 

“One shot was fired but no injuries were reported,” Wilson said. “The suspect took several items from the occupants of the house, as well as one of their vehicles.” 

As previously reported, officers found shell casings at the scene. Wilson said a 22-year-old suspect was identified and officers worked through the morning to locate him. 

Around 6:15 a.m., the suspect was located in the 1800 block of Clay Street and taken into custody without incident. The stolen vehicle and a firearm were seized at the time of arrest. 

The subject remains in custody pending charges.

Police are investigating after a report of shots fired early Wednesday morning in the 2900 block of Seneca Street.

According to Sgt. Wayne Byrom of the St. Joseph Police Department, officers recovered shell casings and were still on scene investigating at 4:15 a.m.

 

Police have identified the body found Thursday in Atchison as the swimmer that went missing Wednesday morning in the Missouri River.

According to the St. Joseph Police Department, the drowning victim was identified as 24-year-old James A. Ford of St. Joseph.

As previously reported, emergency crews began searching for Ford in the Missouri River when another swimmer reported he was swept under by the current around 3 a.m. Wednesday.

 

(Update 10:50 a.m.)  Emergency crews resumed searching after 7 a.m. No body had been recovered as of 10:50 a.m.

According to Captain Jeff Wilson with the St. Joseph Police Department, the Water Patrol Division of the Missouri State Highway Patrol will take over and continue the search later in the day.

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(6:55 a.m.) Officials have suspended the search for safety reasons.  Sgt. Wayne Byrom of the St Joseph Police Department says the fire department will determine when it is safe so they can launch their boats and resume the search.  

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(4:37 a.m.) Crews are searching for a possible drowning victim in the Missouri River Wednesday morning.

Dispatch received a 911 call around 2:50 a.m. from a subject near 77 Francis saying they and one other person were swimming when one of them was caught by the current and went under the water and didn’t come back up.

According to Sergeant Byrom with the St. Joseph Police Department, the other subject got out of the water and called 911.

Fire crews have been out searching the river with no success. The search has been temporarily suspended due to weather conditions and will resume as soon as possible.