Our Farms, Our Future Podcast Features Laura Lengnick and Don Teske

by | Apr 6, 2019 | Speaking

The latest episode of SARE’s Our Farms, Our Future podcast series features Laura Lengnick, a soil scientist and founder of Cultivating Resilience, LLC, a consulting firm that offers ecosystem-based climate risk management and planning services. Lengnick speaks with Don Teske, a fifth-generation farmer in northeastern Kansas who is currently transitioning from cropping to cattle grazing on his farm. They discuss the valuable role of the family farmer in a sustainable food system.

Check out the podcast here! 

Our Farms, Our Future Podcast Features Laura Lengnick and Don Teske

Our Farms, Our Future Podcast Features Laura Lengnick and Don Teske

by | Apr 4, 2019 | Speaking

The latest episode of SARE’s Our Farms, Our Future podcast series features Laura Lengnick, a soil scientist and founder of Cultivating Resilience, LLC, a consulting firm that offers ecosystem-based climate risk management and planning services. Lengnick speaks with Don Teske, a fifth-generation farmer in northeastern Kansas who is currently transitioning from cropping to cattle grazing on his farm. They discuss the valuable role of the family farmer in a sustainable food system.

Check out the podcast here! 

SARE is supported by the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture. Their grant programs are administered regionally, with involvement from producers and others in the agricultural community. Their grassroots structure allows SARE to better identify and support local solutions to local problems. 

The Our Farms, Our Future podcast series brings together the sustainable agriculture community for thought-provoking conversations about the state of agriculture, how we got here, and where we’re headed. 

 

A Farm Beginnings Collaborative Visit with Farmer John

A Farm Beginnings Collaborative Visit with Farmer John

by | Mar 14, 2019 | Educating

Enjoyed spending a day earlier this week at the Angelic Organics Learning Center​ sharing some Resilient Agriculture teaching tips with educators in the Farm Beginnings Collaborative and getting a tour of Angelic Organics led by Farmer John, followed by conversation over wonderful dinner featuring local food at Bushel & Peck’s Local Market​ in South Beloit IL.  The collaborative works together to offer a unique farmer-training program in 14 states that is farmer-led, community-based, and focused on sustainable agriculture.

The tour of Angelic Organics checked off an item on my aggie bucket list!  John Peterson AKA Farmer John led and tour of his greenhouse and field operations, as well as, several beautiful buildings illustrating biodynamic design and construction.  

 John Peterson is the subject of the beautiful 2005 documentary “The Real Dirt on Farmer John,” an epic tale of a maverick Midwestern farmer. John made history through melding his family tradition of farming with the power of art and free expression to become a national model the resurrection of small-scale farming in America. Through highly personal interviews and 50 years of remarkably textured footage, filmmaker Taggart Siegel shares Farmer John’s haunting and humorous odyssey, capturing what it means to be wildly different in a rural community.

If you have not seen this film, get thee to a streaming service, invite some ag/foodie friends over, and watch as soon as you can!

Thanks for a great tour, John!

Climate-Resilient Agriculture Initiative Featured at the Glynwood Climate Convening

Climate-Resilient Agriculture Initiative Featured at the Glynwood Climate Convening

by | Feb 27, 2019 | Educating, Speaking

Headed to the Hudson Valley later this week to release the results of a year-long project led by Cultivating Resilience, LLC and funded by Scenic Hudson that explored the potential for land conservation organizations to promote climate resilience through voluntary conservation incentives:  The Climate-Resilient Agriculture Initiative.

From Scenic Hudson, photo credit: Robert Rodriguez, Jr. 

I’ll open the day-long workshop by sharing results from the Initiative, and will help facilitate a discussion about practical pathways to a climate-resilient Hudson Valley agriculture.  Check out more about the workshop here! 

Scenic Hudson has long been considered a leader in safeguarding the Hudson Valley’s irreplaceable landscapes — including the region’s productive family farms — while advancing balanced and sustainable development, and protecting our land, air and water from pollution and other threats.

Cultivating Climate Resilience on Farms and Ranches: A Review

Cultivating Climate Resilience on Farms and Ranches: A Review

by | Feb 19, 2019 | News

Thanks to Gabrielle Roesch-McNally, USDA Pacific Northwest Climate Hub Fellow, for this review of my SARE bulletin. 

“USDA SARE (Sustainable Agriculture Research & Education) recently published a new resource for land managers and those who advise them titled, “Cultivating Climate Resilience on Farms and Ranches.” This resource outlines some of the challenges that farmers and ranchers will face as climate change leads to more extreme and variable weather. While the resource is national in scope, there is a great table that briefly explores the observed and expected changes in weather across seven U.S. regions, including the Northwest.” 

Check out the rest of the review here!