Cover crops proved themselves foul weather friends during the Great Drought of 2012. A groundbreaking farmer survey conducted in the Upper Mississippi River watershed showed that during that year’s brutal growing season keeping the soil covered with small grains and other plants helped fields preserve enough precious moisture to provide a yield bump of, in… Read More →
Sometimes laboratory science and the reality of what’s happening on the ground intersect in a graphic way. That’s what struck me this morning as I was watching a video shot by Minnesota beekeeper Steve Ellis on May 7. Ellis has documented the die-off of bees on the very day that neighboring fields were planted with… Read More →
On Friday July 20th I traveled with a group from St. Charles to the Chippewa Falls area to view first hand the frac-sand industry. I was so impacted by what I saw I felt I had to share my thoughts. The size and scope of the processing facilities was far greater than I had anticipated.
Not long ago, Rich and Carol Radtke were on a bit of a roll. They had graduated from the Land Stewardship Project’s Farm Beginnings course and felt the program had provided them a solid basis for developing a profitable farming operation on land they and their three children moved to in 2008. Before taking the… Read More →
Stand With LSP in Lakeville, Minn., on Monday, December 18 Monday, December 18, is going to be a big day. Will you join us in Lakeville, Minn., to say NO to factory farms? For more than a year, Land Stewardship Project members in Minnesota’s Goodhue County have been fighting to protect their community from the… Read More →
2025-2026 Farm Beginnings Class LSP is now accepting applications for its 2025-2026 Farm Beginnings class session. For details, click here. Before jumping into agriculture, Kevin Keene worked as a data science consultant for 11 years. So it makes sense that he describes farming success in terms of a mathematical calculation. “The way I think about… Read More →
For months, Land Stewardship Project members have been preparing to hit the ground running during the 2021 Minnesota legislative session to advance rural economic justice across the countryside. The 2021 session begins Tuesday, Jan. 5, and we need you with us. When we come together across zip codes, class, gender, and race, united in our… Read More →
For months, Land Stewardship Project members have been preparing to hit the ground running during the 2021 Minnesota legislative session to advance rural economic justice across the countryside. The 2021 session begins Tuesday, Jan. 5, and we need you with us. When we come together across zip codes, class, gender, and race, united in our… Read More →
When Jay Fuhrer first started talking to his conservation colleagues about a different approach to protecting and building soil, he ended up eating lunch alone. But eventually the Burleigh County Soil Health Team helped launch a movement that’s showing how farming, the environment, and local economies benefit when people stop accepting soil as a degraded resource. More… Read More →
Okay, calculus lesson of the day, courtesy of some pasture grass, fencing and a herd of ruminants. Calculus, in case you’ve forgotten, is the mathematical study of rates of change. It can be a handy way to calculate where you’re headed and how long it will take to get there. Let’s say you are a… Read More →
