Archive for April 2023
MN Ag Water Quality Certified farmers are more profitable!
By Angie Walter • Agricultural Water Quality Certification Project Outreach Coordinator For the fourth year in a row, data analysis shows that farmers who are Ag Water Quality Certified are more profitable than farmers who are not certified. This data comes from the farm financials of farmers enrolled in Farm Business Management. Details on the economic studies…
Read MoreDGA Mentor Roundtable May 1
Angie Walter and the Dairy Grazing Apprenticeship are hosting a free dairy roundtable in Albany, Minn. on Monday, May 1. From 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., aspiring and established dairy producers are invited to meet at Hillcrest Family Restaurant for lunch and discussion. The discussion will focus on how soil and plant health are related,…
Read MoreA Living Room for Soil Biology? Part I
By Jonathan Kilpatrick, Soil Health Specialist Recently, while doing some writing, I was using a voice-to-text application to speed up my work. As I was going back through what I had said, checking for errors and cleaning up the little things that these dictation tools tend to miss, I came across a sentence where I…
Read MoreMeet the Emerging Farmers Office
By Katie Feterl • Communications Director In 2022, the Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) opened the state’s first Emerging Farmers Office. On today’s episode of Dirt Rich, Lillian Otieno and Assistant Commissioner Patrice Bailey of the MDA Commissioner’s Office share how it came to be, the value it brings to our agricultural landscape, and the impacts…
Read MoreTake Time for Wellness this Season
By Dan Zimmerli, Community Organizer and Outreach Coordinator My social media feeds are taken up with farmers filling up their greenhouses and getting excited for the growing season. On my farm, we’re doing the same. During this time of year it’s easy to get excited for all the things to come over the growing season:…
Read More