. >>> we are cooking with one of my favs, the guy who taught me too cook everything, mark bittman, and our puppy with a purpose, sonny is doing great, we miss having him at the studio, he's shari his service and love with hundreds of kids at the viscardi school he helps push this girl's wheelchair, the fastest she has gone she says just seeing his smiling face makes my heart melt he recently reunited with his old pal olivia, so we want to send our best out to sonny, doing some great work. >> speaking of dogs doing great work, coming up in the 3rd hour of "today," we're going to have the story of specially trained k-9s following their noses and literally saving lives. >>> first, mr. roker, do you have a check of the weather. >> yes, we do, starting off with today, record highs in the mid atlantic, southeast, gulf, winter weather advisories out west and then for tomorrow, cooler in the northeast, record highs, though, will continue down to the south with heavy rain through the southwest. that's what's going on around the country, here's what's happening in your >>> good morning. i'm me

newshour weeke special correspondent mark bittman has our story, which is part of our "future of food" series with support om the pulitzer center. >> reporter: it's 90 degrees, a typical july day in iowa. >> alfalfa was planted this spring, the same time i was planting oats. >> reporter: sam bennett is a sixth-generation farmer. his family's been on this land in northwest iowa since 1883. like most farmers here, he grows mainly corn and soybeans. but today, bennett is showing close to 100 fellow farmers some big changes he's making on his land. going to harvest looks like the rye will be ready before the oats. we have about 2,000 acres altogether on our farm. we've started integrating small grains like oats and rye into our rotation, too, and those really aren't crops that are found really anywhere in iowa. there'not a lot of acres of those. >> reporter: this practice of growing a variety of crops--ki a break from the corn and soy beans-- is called"ie diverscrop rotations." bennett says he plants these crops closer together so there are more of them. soil, which improvoil andthe water