There are things we can do to protect our own regional wildlife starting with getting our backyards certified by the National Wildlife Federation as a safe habitat for our fellow Connecticut creatures. via Make your garden a safe habitat for wildlife – NewsTimes.
Annie Farrell, an expert in organic farming who manages the 75-acre Millstone Farm in Wilton, came to Fairfield Wednesday night to help residents create an organic teaching farm in Fairfield.
Hartford, CT – Connecticut Gov. M. Jodi Rell has announced that $200,000 in grants to help Connecticut farmers make long-term improvements to their operations is expected to be approved when the State Bond Commission meets July 13. The grant is awarded through the state Department of Agriculture’s Farm Reinvestment Grant Program, which helps farmers expand
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Gov. M. Jodi Rell bit into a one-of-a-kind strawberry that survived the black vine weevil. It marked the fruition of a legislative campaign to encourage state workers to come up with agricultural inventions. Rell relished a bowl of Rubicon strawberry shortcake Friday afternoon at a press event outside the main lab of the Connecticut Agricultural
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Massaro Farm at 41 Ford Road in Woodbridge, which is noncertified organic, had been preparing for last week for several years. The farm is now part of the state’s growing Community Supported Agriculture trend, where farms sell shares to members. Massaro has 125 members who paid $400 per share and who pick up fresh vegetables
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Experience the only local and organic festival in Connecticut offering a farmer’s market, fresh prepared food, live music, sustainable vendors, artisans, free workshops and free kids activities! 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday Sept. 19 at Manchester Community College. For more information click here.
NEW MILFORD — On Monday, farmer Dean Schultz finished planting corn seeds that will eventually grow and be landscaped into a haunted corn maze. Since it opened in 2000, the Larson’s Farm Market corn maze has become a local tradition.
A collaboration, launched by the Thames Valley Council for Community Action (TVCCA), with charter members F.R.E.S.H (Food: Resources, Education, Security, Health), Ledge Light Health District, and Fairman's company New London Group, aims to help neighbors, schools, agencies, and individuals who want to grow, store, and prepare their own fresh local food. There are social as
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Bad news for vegetable gardeners and farmers. Late blight, a plant disease which spread rapidly throughout the Northeast last year and destroyed tomato and potato plants by the thousands, has been confirmed again this year in Connecticut. Sharon M. Douglas, head of the Department of Plant Pathology and Ecology at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station
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More than 1,500 organic lavender plants (some of the world’s most aromatic flowers) at Quintessential Gardens are in season at Fort Hill Farms in Thompson, Connecticut. Those who wish to cut their own or just stroll and enjoy the scenery, can walk the grounds at the farm recently voted “Best Place to Go Nowhere” in
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With the increased interest in locally-grown-and-raised food has come a recent uptick in preservation of Connecticut farmland-but advocates warn that may not be enough to reach the state’s long-term goals. Despite preserving 1,370 acres of farmland in 2009, a 100 percent increase over the previous year, and an expectation to set aside even more this
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Work share, or “member labor” is a growing trend in the community-supported agriculture movement, a national network of farms, some organic, that are changing food distribution by emphasizing the importance of locally grown produce. At community-supported farms, families can buy a “crop share”— generally paying about $500 — that entitles them to a specified amount
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This year Rosedale Farms & Vineyards in Simsbury, Conn., turns 90, and because of the Simsbury Land Trust, we can expect 90 years more. By placing more than 830 acres of local land under easement, the nonprofit group guarantees that the fields of today will not become the strip malls of tomorrow. via In scenic
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In a June 7 editorial titled “Keep Saving Farmland,” the Hartford Courant expresses some optimism about the prospects of farmland preservation, noting that the 2005 Community Investment Act, a 2007 lump sum bonding program committing $10 million annually to farmland preservation, and “other government and private funds, have created real momentum” in the effort to
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Washington, D.C. — Jon Scholl, President of American Farmland Trust (AFT) said: “The failure of the Murkowski Amendment to pass in the Senate today makes clear that efforts to delay Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulation of green house gasses (GHG) under the Clean Air Act, through similar legislation or lawsuits are not likely to
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Locavore, the term used to describe such a consumer, is relatively new, but it has quickly become a popular word, even leading the New Oxford American Dictionary to name it its 2007 Word of the Year. The idea is to pay greater attention to the food one purchases and eats. People are encouraged to support
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As we reacquaint ourselves with the value of local agriculture, the good news in Connecticut is that farmland preservation is up. The bad news is that we are still losing more farms than we are saving. According to the recently-released state Council on Environmental Quality’s annual environmental assessment, Connecticut is losing about 1,800 acres of
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NEW HAVEN — How do you get kids excited about eating real food instead of the salty, processed stuff that comes out of a box? Introduce them to a chef. That’s the idea behind first lady Michelle Obama’s new initiative “Chefs Move to Schools,” which encourages chefs to adopt schools, promote healthful eating and educate
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Douglas L. Zehner, state conservationist for the USDA-Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) in Connecticut, announced today that the agency has published the final regulations governing the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP). Authorized in the 2008 Farm Bill, CSP is a voluntary program that offers payments to producers who exercise good land stewardship and want to improve
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A note from CT NOFA Executive Director Bill Duesing: Urban Agriculture You’ve probably heard about the wonderful and exciting growth of urban agriculture in this country as more people understand the importance of a healthy, local food supply, especially in the cities where so many folks don’t have access to good food. At various NOFA
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