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Cornell Study Finds Solar’s Threat to NYS Agriculture May Be Overstated – Morning Ag Clips

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Cornell Study Finds Solar’s Threat to NYS Agriculture May Be Overstated – Morning Ag Clips

ITHACA, N.Y. — New York state farmers who signed large-scale solar leases were three times more likely to say they’ll use the revenue from solar to invest in their farms than to reduce operations, according to a new study.

Nearly half of the farmers with leases said they did not plan to change their agricultural practices at all.

The study, published Feb. 21 in Rural Sociology, dispels the myth that farmers will give up farming, with its unpredictable returns, when offered lucrative solar leases for their land

“People have been talking about this for a long time, but nobody had asked quantitatively: For farmers, if you sign a lease, what do you intend to do?” said principal investigator Richard Stedman, professor and interim director of the Cornell CALS Ashley School in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. “It’s a reasonable conclusion from this study: Large-scale solar does not appear to be the death of farming.”

The findings were based on the survey responses of 584 landowners in three New York state counties most likely to have large-scale solar development. Landowners owned 30 or more acres that were classified as rural, agricultural or vacant and were adjacent to transmission lines or substations. The researchers found that nearly half of the respondents had been approached by large-scale solar developers; farmers were twice as likely than non-farmers to be solicited but were less likely to sign leases.

Raising Charolais Cattle

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Dennis Martin tells us what it is like raising Charolais Cattle in the western part of North Carolina and about public perceptions on where their food comes from.

New England – New York Sheep Craze – 1840

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If you ever wonder why there is so many stone walls in the woods, the answer is the Merino Sheep Craze of the 1830s, when the ultra-soft, itch-free Merino wool reached a record breaking price of 57 cents/pound in 1835.
 
During the height of the Sheep Craze there was over one million sheep in Vermont, and 271,000 sheep in Rutland County alone -- and in Addison County more then 350 sheep per square mile. Forests were cleared, stones pulled out of fields and pilled up as fence rows to keep sheep in.
 

 

New England - New York Sheep Craze - 1840

I am always jealous of all the rednecks … 👩‍🌾

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I am often quite jealous of rednecks, because they know so much more about the land, mechanical things, and technology then I will ever know. They seem to make so much out of life and the things they own, and are able to fix and extend broken things that I have little choice to toss or take to someone else to repair. They have such a knowledge of land and natural systems, physical systems, and the way the world works, that I will never have a chance to fully understand.