Eliminate the guessing
by Sally Colby
Pregnancy checking is an important aspect of gauging reproductive efficiency in beef herds, and helps producers monitor and improve reproductive efficiency. (more…)
The magical puffball
by Troy Bishopp
You see something white from afar. Your heart rate and pace quicken. As you reach the trophy sphere, it becomes apparent you have found the coveted, magical puffball. What a win for your palate and the storytelling that will follow, amidst its tender, earthy flesh sautéing in butter. (more…)
Farm Aid 2018
by Michael Wren
HARTFORD, CT – In 1985 Willie Nelson, Neil Young and John Mellencamp hosted a concert to help raise awareness of the loss of family farms across America and raise funds to help keep farmers on their land. Thirty-three years later they are still playing, with many more artists joining them to support family farms.
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Horse Tales: Preparing for winter
Preparing for winter
It’s barely autumn — but we’re thinking that there might be a long, hard winter coming. These past few weeks we’ve remarked that we’ve never seen so many squirrels and chipmunks in the yard — there have been several chipmunks in the chickens’ fenced in run stealing chicken feed each morning, squirrels chasing each other and falling out of trees, squirrels knocking over chipmunks on their way to the bird feeders,… and yesterday the mystery was solved as to what was happening to all the apples in my October apple tree when I saw a squirrel run up the tree, grab a big apple in its mouth and run back down the tree with it! (more…)
Climate Smart Farming encouraged at twilight meeting
by Elizabeth A. Tomlin
It seems that more challenges are facing all sectors of agriculture today, no matter which way you turn. And climate change is one of those buzzword phrases that get farmers talking – and thinking. (more…)
Shades of the Wizard of Oz: DAR-Ridge Farm
by Laura Rodley
COLRAIN, MA – A barn gets lifted up and carried away. We’re not in Kansas anymore; we’re in Western Massachusetts. It wasn’t a tornado that lifted this structure but microburst winds during a storm on June 18, strong enough to lift an unfinished barn off its sturdy foundation and move it 20 feet. (more…)
Bringing home the bacon with 4-H
by Courtney Llewellyn
LANCASTER, MA – When one hears the name “Lancaster,” often the first thing that comes to mind is the bucolic town in Pennsylvania renowned nationwide for its old school agrarian practices. This Lancaster, located in northern Worcester County, is known as the “mothertown” to most of eastern central Massachusetts. (more…)
Milk quality matters
by Sally Colby
Whether a dairy herd is large or small, ensuring milk quality is an important aspect of management. Dr. Frank Welcome, veterinarian with Quality Milk Production Services in Ithaca, NY, explained some of the factors that contribute to or hinder quality milk. (more…)
Forage intercropping for resilience
by Tamara Scully
A presentation by Cornell professor Matt Ryan, and PhD student Ann Bybee-Finley, of the Sustainable Cropping Systems Laboratory, discussing an ongoing three-year forage resiliency experiment, was held recently in conjunction with a pasture walk at Larry and Denise Moore’s 270-acre certified-organic dairy farm in Lansing, NY. (more…)
The Woodstock Creamery
by George Looby
In 1888 a group of Woodstock, CT, farmers decided that the time had come to pool resources and construct a building to be used as a creamery in which to store their milk prior to its being shipped to a processing plant in Worcester, Providence or Hartford. Being a rather innovative group, they decided to call the business the Woodstock Creamery. (more…)
Monumental farming stability
by Karen Van Wyk
Farming is not a “get rich quick” business but a business which at its foundation excels in other values such as family stability, healthy pride and community responsibility. The James family story depicts these values precisely. (more…)
2018 Agri-Mark Dairy Summit brings proposals to the table
by Elizabeth A. Tomlin
“The dairy industry has been in trouble for many years and few outside of the industry and rural America know it,” acknowledged Robert Haefner. (more…)
