by Karl H. Kazaks
GLADESBORO, VA – Danny Cassell has been farming since he was big enough to walk behind the cabbage setter. He bought his first tractor in 1976. Today he is a fulltime farmer and has been for eight years, growing mainly pumpkins and sweet corn but also collards, kale, acorn, butternut and spaghetti squash. [Read more…]
by Tamara Scully
The Northeast may not be the hottest region in the country, yet it has seen an increasing amount of hot days, where the temperature-humidity index (THI) rises above 72 points, the level at which thermal neutrality is breeched and dairy cows begin to be negatively impacted by heat stress. Climate change predictions for the region indicate that an increase in the amount of days where a heat stress event occurs, as well as an increase in the duration and intensity of such events, is all but inevitable. [Read more…]
by Bill and Mary Weaver
During this year’s Ag Progress Days, one of the many safety demonstrations put on for those in attendance was a simulated rescue of an accident victim from a minivan. Two volunteer rescue companies, Millheim and Miles Twp., along with PSU EMS, outlined the steps and procedures needed to extract a victim safely and without causing further injury. [Read more…]
by Steve Wagner
Insiders call it High Path AI. Yet, if it is high path, why hasn’t avian flu yet reached Pennsylvania? That was the question I put to PA Ag Secretary Russell Redding prior to his chairing of a town hall style seminar titled Preparation for Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza [HPAI] at the Lancaster Farm & Home Center. “It is H5N2,” Redding said. “What we know at this point is that it does not like hot weather. [Read more…]
by Sally Colby
A hayride accident that resulted in the death of a young woman and injury to at least 20 others last fall on a Maine farm garnered national attention, especially among those who look forward to fall- and Christmas-themed attractions hosted by farms.Bill Fetherolf, co-owner of Pioneer Evergreen Farms in Orwigsburg, PA, says on the day following the tragic accident, he was inundated with phone calls from both media and concerned people who wanted to know if the hayride at his farm was safe.