NEWS BLOG – Page 2
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USDA’s goal of small town rejuvenation
USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack rejects the “get big or get out” approach to farming. Instead, he touts multiple revenue streams as the means for farmers to both increase their income and help spark the diversified agricultural economies needed to rejuvenate small towns.
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2024 Conservation Cropping Seminar
The annual Conservation Cropping Seminar will be taking place January 31, 2024 with both virtual and in-person options (registration). The event will be held from 9am-3:30pm with the in-person attendees meeting at the Illinois Department of Agriculture Building in Springfield. The in-person event costs only $25 (lunch included) and the virtual tickets are only $15. […]
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Illinois Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy 2023 Biennial Report
The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, Illinois Department of Agriculture, and University of Illinois Extension recently released the Illinois Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy 2023 Biennial Report, which highlights efforts to reduce nutrient loss from non-point source, point source, and urban stormwater sectors across the state. The Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy (NLRS) is a state-wide effort to […]
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Generations Connect on Ag Field Day
Participants of the Chicago Wilderness Alliance 2023 Kane County Farm Tour visit CHS Elburn. Maggie Soliz recently came face-to-face with agricultural diversity in her native Kane County. Located 45 miles west of downtown Chicago, Kane County is a model for proactive land use planning. Voluntary farmland preservation conservation easements are among tools used to strike […]
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Kane County strives to strike urban/rural balance
Illinois Prairie Pollinator Rain Garden at the Kane County Farm Bureau, Saint Charles. Located 45 miles west of Chicago’s Millennium Park, Kane is Illinois’ fifth most populated county and the Land of Lincoln’s leader for proactive land use planning to support agriculture. Three decades ago, Kane County leaders watched suburban sprawl transform neighboring DuPage County. […]
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Willis sees NRCS as eager partner in Illinois agroecology initiatives
Tammy Willis, the new USDA State Conservationist for Illinois, came away from the recent 75th annual conference of the Association of Illinois Soil and Water Conservation Districts with a strong sense of optimism. “As we look ahead, I’m excited for the potential of our organizations working together,” she said. “We have a unique opportunity to […]
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Ohio conservation innovator and emissary leaves forward-looking legacy
David Brandt – the man in the meme – looks like somebody sent from Central Casting to a movie director who wanted The Quintessential Farmer on the set. But truth is stranger than fiction, and Brandt was not an actor. He was the real deal. Randall Reeder, The Ohio State University Extension agricultural engineer, co-authored an article […]
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Taking AIM for the Land of Lincoln
Agricultural innovation, like the crops we grow, must come from the bottom up. Some big ideas may come from laboratories and think tanks, but it’s at the ground level – in a farmer’s hands – that things take root. Through a $14 million federal grant, the Natural Resources Division of the Illinois Department of Agriculture […]
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Conservation Planner finds calling before untimely death
Derek Welveart’s occasional childhood work detasseling corn, walking bean fields, and baling hay on the farmland around his hometown of Atkinson, in west central Henry County, was more about money in his pocket than a love of the land or a passion for agriculture. But it nonetheless planted a seed. Welveart died June 17 in […]
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Southern Illinois farmer earns inaugural Illinois Leopold Conservation Award
For the past 50 years, Dennis Frey has been farming patches of the rolling Southern Illinois terrain in Hamilton County that is now entering its fifth generation in the family. When he started, it was a traditional diversified family farm, with hogs, cattle, corn, soybeans, wheat, barley, and other crops. Over time, it evolved to […]