LEWISTON, Minn. — On Jan. 4, five “agricultural groups” filed an amici curiae (friend of the court) motion with the Minnesota Court of Appeals in support of Daley Farm’s request that a recent District Court ruling be overturned, thus allowing the Lewiston dairy operation to circumvent Winona County’s zoning rules related to livestock operation size.… Read More →
I got a call from a colleague this morning asking how I was dealing with the corona virus pandemic and I said I was feeling grateful. Grateful to live in a rural area where my primary activity outside of working for the Land Stewardship Project is goofing around outside collecting firewood and going for long… Read More →
ELGIN, Minn. — Beginning farmers looking for land and retiring farmers seeking next-generation farmers are encouraged to attend a special Land Stewardship Project workshop on Saturday, March 25, from 9:45 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., at Peace United Methodist Church (52497 275th Ave.), in Elgin. “LSP’s Networking Farming Generations: Beginning with Hope, Retiring with Security” is… Read More →
ELGIN, Minn. — Beginning farmers looking for land are encouraged to attend a special Land Stewardship Project (LSP) workshop on Saturday, March 4, from 9:30 a.m. to 3 p.m., at Peace United Methodist Church (52497 275th Ave.), in Elgin. LSP’s “Beginning Farmer Land Access Workshop: Assessing Risks, Affordability and Land Access Options” is for aspiring… Read More →
Meet Sasa Organic Farms, a collective of Kenyan farmers. Sasa is five family farms: Dawn2Dusk Organic Farms, Lisaviole Farms, Lisaviole Organic Farms, Green Joy Farm, Gedef Organic Farm, and Laurens Organic Farm. They provide Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) shares, produce, and seedlings to customers in and around Minnesota’s Twin Cities. Like many beginning farmers, their goal… Read More →
Governor Mark Dayton announced in January his proposal to require an additional 125,000 acres of perennial vegetation along lakes, rivers and streams. There is a long history of utilizing such living borders to filter out fertilizers and herbicides, while fortifying streambanks and reducing the amount of eroded soil that ends up in the water. While… Read More →
Note: This is the 2nd installment in the 12-part “A Sense of Where You Are” series. One of the ways Rachelle and Jordan Meyer keep things in context is to avoid being distracted by what they call “the woman in the red dress.” Is a new enterprise a good fit for the farm, or is… Read More →
LEWISTON, Minn. — Land Stewardship Project (LSP) members applauded today’s decision by the Minnesota District Court to deny Daley Farm’s latest attempt to circumvent Winona County’s rules related to the size of large livestock operations. (The Court’s decision is available here.) For the past four years, Daley Farm has sought a variance from the county’s… Read More →
Good things go bad when out of their rightful places. Take farm fertilizer and soil, essential ingredients in the field but all wrong in the 27 percent of Minnesota lakes now too contaminated to drink. Last month’s report from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) blasted corn-and-soybean agriculture as the major source of nitrogen contamination… Read More →
Pack-shed or people? That’s the question Les Macare and Els Dobrick are grappling with on a dank day in mid-March as they brave a biting wind to inspect the garden plots, cover crops, and outbuildings on Racing Heart Farm in western Wisconsin. With the exception of some onions sprouting in one of the hoop houses,… Read More →
