“During the farm transition process, we can feel frustrated, feel like we’re grasping at straws to find solutions. We also become suspicious of other people. Sometimes we make negative assumptions about other people’s motives. We start to experience a downward spiral. We feel stuck. This is how ever...

You can do so much on so little, especially with herbs. That was the message Michael Kilpatrick, founder of Growing Farmers and the Farm on Central in Franklin, Ohio, an eight-acre urban farm, provided during the recent Herbal Entrepreneur Conference. Kilpatrick addressed what to look for when findi...

Chris Callahan and Becky Maden of University of Vermont Extension discussed high tunnel ventilation during a Vermont Vegetable & Berry Growers Association webinar. Callahan is an agriculture engineer and Maden is a vegetable nutrient management specialist. According to Callahan, excessive temperatur...

“Bending, squatting, grabbing, twisting, pulling, pushing, cutting, walking, running, jumping, dragging, digging, pounding, lifting, tossing, catching, reaching. These are all examples of ways you’re likely incorporating physical activity into your farming duties regularly,” said Kate Graves. Graves...

About 10 years ago, farmers started to feel this pressure, this need to pay attention and be involved in consumer engagement. “It’s a weird thing that we agreed consumer engagement is a thing we needed to focus on,” said Janice Person of Grounded and Rising , a community and training platform focuse...

Many are familiar with the phrase “stop and smell the roses,” which encourages us to take a break from our usual hustle and bustle. A presentation at Cultivate’22 , however, flipped that notion on its head. Cathryn Fageros, the business process improvement manager at Ball Seed Company, spoke about u...

I just finished an excellent book, “ Mountain Man: John Colter, the Lewis and Clark Expedition and the Call of The American West ” by David Weston Marshall; now I am reading “ Guardians of the Valley: John Muir and the Friendship that Saved Yosemite ” by Dean King. The breadth and intensity of the w...

Fun fact: agriturismo is how you say agritourism in Italian. It is an enormously popular enterprise in Italy, so much so that the first International Workshop on Agritourism was hosted there in 2018. (The most recent one took place in Burlington, VT; it returns to Italy in 2024.) However, as the des...

A 530-acre gem of a farm, hidden away but not far from densely populated areas of Howard County, MD, is drawing customers for more than one reason. In addition to growing a variety of greenhouse crops, Sharp’s Farm at Waterford is dedicated to education. Alexander Harrell, who’s currently in his sev...