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LANSING - GARDEN PROJECT COMMUNITY GARDEN TOURS
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DETROIT – DETROIT AGRICULTURE NETWORK TOUR
The Detroit Agriculture Network's 15th annual tour of the city's gardens and farms is coming up soon.
The Aug. 1 event will highlight backyard, school, community and market gardens that are among thenearly 1,400 gardens in Detroit's Garden Resource Program. The tour also seeks to educate about ongoing city planning discussions
related to agriculture in the city.
Bike and bus tours are planned through different parts of the city, starting at Eastern Market. The fee for the tours is a sliding scale of $1 to $20.
Tour details and registration information are posted on the Detroit Agriculture Network's website or email [log in to unmask]">[log in to unmask] to
register.
FLINT - EDIBLE FLINT FOOD GARDEN TOUR
The 2012 edible flint Food Garden Tour will be held Thursday,August 9th from 4:30 pm - 8:30 pm at the Flint Farmers' Market.
Click
here to register.
The Food Garden Tour work group’s goals are to showcase a diversity of gardens that are transforming neighborhoods, increasing property values, employing youth, removing blight, increasing food access, improving diets & decreasing
grocery bills and build civic pride and community goodwill.
Pest Management for Organic Production Systems II
July 26 webinar on ecologically friendly practices is second in a series
Organic production requires diversity both above ground and below ground in order to be sustainable.
A July 26 webinar, “Pest Management for Organic Production Systems II” – which will be broadcast by the National Center for Appropriate Technology – will discuss ecologically friendly practices that support organic pest
management, including trap cropping, perimeter trap cropping, crop rotations, pheromone use, and other techniques, as well as their impacts on pests and beneficials.
NCAT Program Specialist Rex Dufour will be the webinar presenter.
The webinar will build on an earlier one, Pest Management for Organic Production Systems. That webinar covered conservation practices such as soil management, hedgerows, and other beneficial habitat-management practices and strategies.
It is available at https://attra.ncat.org/video/index.php. The webinars are funded in part by the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service.
Title: Pest Management for Organic Production Systems II
Date and time: July 26 at 1 p.m. Eastern Time
To register: Click on the following link
https://attra.ncat.org/pestmanagement.
About the presenter: Rex Dufour's background is in entomology and integrated pest management. His work experience includes managing sustainable development projects in Thailand and
Laos. Mr. Dufour has worked as both project manager and program specialist for NCAT and heads NCAT's California office. In addition to the ATTRA project, he is involved in several minority farmer outreach projects.
Four
Seasons Produce Co-op
Food Safety Mock Audit
Monday, July 30, 2012
Learn about on-farm food safety while growing produce in fields and in hoophouses year-round to become food safety certified to market, as a group, to hospital
and university customers. This farm tour and mock audit with Michigan State University Extension Educator, Phil Tocco, will help participants know what to expect when looking at third-party food safety certification.
9 a.m. – 12 p.m.
Todosciuk Farms and Greenhouses
5611 Preston Rd
Howell Michigan 48855
Hosts: Jim and Tina Todosciuk
RSVP by July 27
Space limited to 30 spots
Please RSVP to the MIFFS office at 517-432-0712 or [log in to unmask] or register online at www.miffs.org/events.asp.
Spaces are limited, so register early!
Know
Your Farmer, Know Your Food Compass Map
The USDA has released the updated “know your Farmer, Know your Food Compass Map. This identifies and locates food projects around the US, including urban farming, farmers markets and community food hubs. This is a great way
to find new and possible markets for farmers, explain food systems to students, and learn what gardening and farm opportunities are in your area or across the US.
The new version of the USDA Know Your Food, Know Your Farmer Compass Map now offers users manymore functions and map information. Search for local food themes and topics by text, location, and radius; view from a choice of base
maps; and see many additional sources of data. There are numerous other changes responding to your to phase I map recommendations.
To obtain the Glossary descriptions of USDA data sets and download data as needed,
click here. For Frequently Asked Questions about the Compass map and how to use it,
click here.
Visit:
http://www.usda.gov/maps/maps/kyfcompassmap.htm
Benefits, Challenges, and Solutions for
Pasture-based Dairy Management
Thursday August 9, 2012 (9 a.m. to 4 p.m.)
Michigan State University
W.K. Kellogg Biological Station
3700 E. Gull Lake Drive, Hickory Corners, MI 49060
Atrium Conference Room (second floor of Academic Building)
The workshop will focus on the benefits of pasture-based dairy systems and the challenges faced by farmers using this system in Michigan and the Upper Midwest.
A keynote presentation by Laura Paine, Grazing and Organic Agriculture Specialist, WI Department of Agriculture, Trade, and Consumer Protection (Why Graze?) and research presentation by
Diana Stuart, Michigan State University & Becky Schewe, Mississippi State University (Benefits, Challenges, and Solutions for Pasture-based Dairy Management) will kickoff the program. The program will include focus group discussions on
issues important to pasture-based dairy farmers and a panel discussion with experts in the management of pasture-based dairy systems. There will also be plenty of time for networking with other workshop attendees. A tour of the KBS Dairy facilities will
follow the workshop.
Dairy farmers and other livestock farmers, Extension Educators, policy makers, and others with an interest in the development of sustainable dairygrazing systems and marketing strategies for Michigan pasture-based dairy farms
are encouraged to attend.
This is a free event but registration is requested so that we can plan for lunch and snacks. To register contact Mat Haan (269-671-2360,
[log in to unmask]) or register on-line at
www.kbs.msu.edu/research/pasture-dairy/dairy-events.
If you have questions contact Becky Schewe (269-671-2237,
[log in to unmask]
) or Mat Haan (269-671-2360, [log in to unmask]).
National Grass FedConference- Norfolk NE Sept 20-22
Did you know that today’s retail sales of
grass fed beef in the US are totaling more than $2.5billion? Want to learn the
latest and most pertinent information about the grassfed industry and products? Come to the
Grassfed Exchange Conference, September 20- 22, 2012 in Norfolk, NE! Take a tour of two of the best mob grazers in the US, listen to several outstanding individuals
who are helping change the way grassfed meat is produced, participate in stimulating panel discussions, and interact one on one to get new ideas!
The goal of the
conference is to provide you with some of
the latest and most pertinent information about the grassfed industry. We feel the quality of the attendees is outstanding and that the networkingalone is worth making the expense and effort to come.
Our featured speakers, who will challenge us to improve the way we produce high quality grassfed meat are:
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Dr. Garry Lacefield, KY, an internationally known forage specialist who will share with us in a direct, yet fun, and down to earth way.
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Gabe Brown, ND, will share his experience and knowledge of the use of cover crops. Many of his ideas will be take home advice.
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Will Harris, GA, will share how he grazes multispecies and direct markets a large quantity of his own animals.
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Mark Schatzker, author of the book “Steak”. He will give us a unique and humorous insight into how the consumer looks at the product we produce.
Included this year will be a special treat to visit two of the best mob grazers in the US. There will be
speakers on the buses to and from the ranches, livestock and vendor displays at the conference location, and producer, direct marketer, and buyers’ panels to participate in at the conference.
We believe this conference will be one you will not want to miss. Come and learn about the opportunities that will help us continue to grow the grass fed market in a profitable and sustainable manner and potentially create
new opportunities for all interested producers.
I am truly looking forward to seeing each of you in Norfolk, NE on September 20-22, 2012!
NEW Online Registration
is available for all seminar participation; tickets, displays and vendors.
Wayne Rasmussen,
The Grassfed Exchange
Ag Management and Business News
Community lenders take proactive approach to financing smaller farms
Report presents innovations in lending to local food producers
Are you starting a new farm?? Seeking to expand and want a reasonable
means to finance your farm improvements?? Read on, I think you will find this report very USEFUL!!!
EAST LANSING, Mich. — Small farmers often resort to credit cards to finance their farm businesses. A national team of community lenders and farm business advisors, convened by the Michigan State University Center for Regional
Food Systems (CRFS), has released a report on successful approaches to providing needed capital to smaller farms.
The new report by the Financing Farming in the U.S. (FFUS) team,
Strengthening Metrics and Expanding Capital Access, explores innovative practices that a number of Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) are employing with America’s growing crop of small- and midsize diversified farms. This is the second
FFUS report on lending to such farms, which do not fit well into a standardized lending protocol.
“Smaller farms in local markets may harvest more than 30 types of vegetables and send them through four or five different markets, from farmers’ market to wholesale distributors,” said Dorothy Suput, executive director of The
Carrot Project, a small farm financing organization in New England, and a member of the FFUS team. “It’s difficult for most lenders to pencil out how that will result in timely loan payments, especially since most lenders have moved away from financing farming
in recent generations.”
In addition to case studies from CDFIs, the report provides a farm underwriting framework for lenders, which the FFUS team prepared for a nationwide
Financing Healthy Food training curriculum through the Opportunity Finance Network, the national association of CDFIs. The training is part of the Obama administration’s Healthy Food Financing Initiative, a partnership of the federal departments of Treasury,
Agriculture, and Health and Human Services that brings together a range of interventions for increasingaccess to healthy foods.
“We’re pleased that these trainings were very well-attended,” said Susan Cocciarelli, FFUS project manager. “It shows the interest in financing smaller farms, as well as the challenges, because there is no ‘one size fits all’
approach; lenders have to want to do it and learn how to do it.”
The new report also offers recommendations for building the farm financing capacity and confidence of lenders and financial investors in thesmall and midsized diversified farming sector. In the report, the FFUS teamcalls for
a national network of learning communities designed to share knowledge and connect limited resources. Many practitioners have expertise,perspective and resources to share, and many new financing mechanisms and investors, such as the Slow Money network and
Internet crowd-funding sites, are part of the growing set of resources and opportunities for small farm financing.
The Strengthening Metrics and Expanding Capital Access
report can be found athttp://foodsystems.msu.edu/uploads/file/FFUS_Strengthening_Metrics_report.pdf
Additional information: The US Treasury CDFI Fund offers CDFIs supportive information for capacity building in the farm production sector lending.
Case studies of 5 CDFI approaches/experiences
http://www.cdfifund.gov/what_we_do/resources/Food%20Prod%20Case%20Studies%20Final.pdf
Background for lenders on small farm sector:
http://www.cdfifund.gov/what_we_do/resources/Understanding-Food-Production-Sector.pdf
Primer on lending skills needed for sector:
Financing Farming in the U.S. (FFUS) is a project designed to help increase the flow of capital into the small- and midscale farming sector. The nature and value of the original research findings provided by the project has
spurred FFUS network growth to over twenty-five national and community-based entities. Beginning as an exploration of the obstacles and opportunities associated with financing farming production, the network now includes policy-makers and practitioners across
the country.
The Michigan State University Center for Regional Food Systems unites the applied research, education, and outreach expertise of faculty and staff members at MSU to advance understanding of and engagement with regional food
systems. CRFS works to build a thriving economy, equity and sustainability for Michigan, the country and the planet through food systems rooted in local regions and centered on food that is healthy, green, fair and affordable.
Smart cultivation to manage weeds and retain moisture
Conserving soil moisture in vegetables: Effects of weed management and cover crop mulches
To see graph and photos visit: http://msue.anr.msu.edu/news/conserving_soil_moisture_in_vegetables_effects_of_weed_management_and_cover_crop_mulches
During hot, dry summers like this, timely weed management and retention of surface mulch can help reduce crop stress and minimize irrigation costs.
Posted on July 18, 2012 by Dan Brainard, Michigan State University Extension, Department of Horticulture
Effects of weeds on soil moisture
Many weeds are voracious consumers of water. For example, large crabgrass and common lambs quarters use over 80 gallons of water to produce 1 lb of plant tissue. Evidence from our trials in asparagus suggests that such thirsty
weeds may deplete soil moisture by as much as 0.5 inches per week in the heat of the summer. Under these conditions, timely removal of weeds reduces irrigation costs and improves crop yields.
Effects of cover crop mulch on soil moisture
Under reduced tillage systems, rye or wheat cover crops left on the soil surface can be very helpful for conserving soil moisture. For example, lastweek in our strip-tilled sweet corn trials, plots with rye residue on the soil
surface had approximately 5 percent greater water content in the top 10 inches then plots without rye mulch (Table 1). This is equivalent to about 0.5 inches of irrigation savings.
Thecombined
effects of weeds and mulches have been very noticeable in our winter squash research trials this year (Photos 1-3). Where crabgrass is present, winter squash plants are wilting noticeably within two days of irrigation. In contrast, where weeds are effectively
controlled with cultivation and herbicides, winter squash is relatively unstressed. The least stressed plants are those that were planted into a winter rye residue using a strip-till system.
For more information on the costs and benefits of strip-tillage systems for vegetables, contact the Dan Brainard at
[log in to unmask].
Dr. Brainard’s work is funded in part by
MSU’s AgBioResearch.
Additional information:
•
MSU Extension’s
Drought Resources
Please complete survey to offer ideas how to improve Michigan Marketing Guide
The Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development is conducting a survey on the value of Growing Michigan's Future: A Guide to Marketing Your Michigan Food and Agriculture Products.
Our records indicate that you received a copy of the Marketing Guide. As a result, your participation in this survey would be much appreciated, as it will assist us in completing an update to the Marketing Guide.
Here is a link to the survey:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=7YX8VUs8Z_2bwt7EAkqGOB_2bQ_3d_3d . This link is uniquely tied to
this survey and your email address. Please do not forward this message.
To view a PDF version of the Marketing Guide please visit
http://michigan.gov/documents/mda/MDA_guide_335948_7.pdf
For additional information on the guide, contact MDARD at 517-373-2469
Thank you for your participation!
END