The Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay has a program that helped us be more efficient and safer farmers with conservation vouchers. It’s called the Healthy Streams Farm Stewardship program. It awards $3,000 worth of conservation vouchers per acre of riparian forest buffer up to $20,000. In addition, the program allows […]
The worst of the COVID-19 pandemic is over. Science, reason, and truth prevailed over doubt, fear, and lies this year. In this post, I’ll share some pictures and thoughts from 2022 that may bring you some hope and healing for the new year. Note: All photos by R. Whitescarver unless […]
A Historic Day for Farmland Staunton, Virginia: It was a hot summer day on August 4. We met the senior easement specialist with the Virginia Outdoors Foundation at our lawyer’s office to walk the four blocks to the courthouse. Our lawyer, Alan Garrison, said he could have recorded our conservation deed […]
Note: The text of this post was published in the Virginia Mercury on 9/1/2022. My wife and I are beef cattle farmers in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. Two years ago, we enrolled in Virginia’s Agricultural Best Management Practice Cost-Share program. We used this state funding to fence our cattle […]
The grazing season is in full swing at Whiskey Creek Angus, and the bulls are in with the ladies. We rotate our two herds of cattle to different pastures about every four to six days depending on the growth of the forage. The tree seedlings we planted last year are […]
Jeanne and I were successful at getting the county to amend its comprehensive plan so that part of our farm will be classified as urban open space instead of low-density housing. We paid a fee to apply for the change and spoke at two public hearings before the county’s board […]
Imagine paddling a canoe upstream forever. That’s my metaphor for environmental activism. Activists have been paddling against the current with the Clean Water Act on their backs ever since its passage 50 years ago. We have made a lot of progress, but it’s been against the current the whole time—and […]
Thirty years ago, Wayne M. Hypes, one of my heroes and a mentor in soil conservation, came into my USDA office in Verona, Virginia, and gave me a wooden candleholder. It was no ordinary candleholder: It was made from American Chestnut, historic wood from a forgotten past. At that time […]
Our Border Collie, Valentino, is a therapy dog. He’s also the best cattle herding dog I have ever seen. We call him Val for short. If he’s awake, he’s “on.” Sometimes, with a big smile on our faces, we call him Valium. Watch Val and Jeanne move our herd of […]
A farm in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia was going to be the storage site for millions of gallons of industrial food waste and other sludges until the community rose up to fight the project. Industrial food residuals, poultry slaughter rendering residuals, and bio-solids from other counties and perhaps other […]
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