Growing hemp was illegal in the U.S. for decades. But recent changes in federal law have opened the door to growing the crop. So as farmers across the country begin to experiment with hemp, hosts Zach Johnson and Mitchell Hora decide to learn more about commercial hemp production. In October, Mitchell visited Scott Thellman at Juniper Hill Farms in Kansas to hear about his first stab at growing industrial hemp. They talk sourcing seeds, keeping hemp under legal THC limits, harvesting with chainsaws, and much more.
I’ve heard a lot about hemp farming in the past but didn’t know much about it. Apparently it’s a good thing for farmers to live in a state that also has a recreational system in case the hemp comes in too hot. Also, since hemp has become federally legal the growers have greatly expanded while the market have grown more slowly, leaving it hard to market some of the production. Definitely interesting interview.
Agriculture means field cultivation. Cultivating fields is a big part of farming but a lot of agriculture, is not field crops as much as grasses.
Grasses for pasture and hay, converted by rumens, especially beef cattle 🐮 into meat 🥩. A lot of areas aren’t really well suited for field crops and tillage due to slope and shallow soils but grow grass pretty darn well. Some corn silage 🌽 is a required for high performance Holstein dairy cattle but not so much for beef and other breeds.
You can see that well on the National Land Cover Dataset for New York. There are far more acres of pasture and hay (yellow) than cultivated crops (brown) even in many rural farming parts of the state. 🗺
"I've had lots of questions on why I use prescribed burning to maintain my property. Fire is an amazing tool to help control unwanted vegetation such as cedar trees."
From time to time, I correspond and chat with the author of the burn barrel country blog, which celebrates the rural freedom and often stinky practice of burning your household trash in a burn barrel. He says he doesn’t update his blog much anymore, because any time he posts something, one of the greenies is out there flaming him and threatening to report him as a polluter on his Oklahoma acreage.
We got chatting over the topic of freedom to do what you want on your own land, kind of came to a consensus that if you not harming your neighbors then so be it. Nobody is going to care if you burn things, if your not smoking out your neighbors, leaving them in a toxic haze, or starting wildfires. It’s like having a plinking in your backyard, riding four wheelers, raising smelly pigs or having horny buck goats — doesn’t really matter if you have enough land. Nobody is going to report you or even care, if you aren’t causing a nuisance on what you do in your back 40.
I think legalized marijuana will be wonderful for agriculture 🚜🌿
I can’t imagine a better way to get young adults interested in genetics, plant cultivation and preparation of commodities than legalized marijuana. Unlike hops and home brew beer production, marijuana is relatively easy to grow in a pot outdoors and prepare in the home. It literally could be a gateway drug to homesteading and careers in agriculture and bioscience. Families that might never grow lettuce or tomatoes in their back patio might grow cannabis for home use in baking or smoking.
Not to mention that cannabis may be a big and up and coming market for farmers and other growers. While hemp is an interesting and valuable crop, it’s hard to make a business out of it without also doing marijuana – as hemp with too much THC is cannabis. It would be like having a dairy farm but no market for dairy steers. Or running a hog barn without a crop business to spread the manure on. Or plastics manufacture without oil and gas fuel businesses. If you have people growing food grade cannabis then it opens up a lot of potential uses for fast growing hemp. Cannabis could also provide an additional line of business for dairies to get into.
MADISON COUNTY, N.Y. (WSYR-TV) — Hundreds of essential workers want to be next in line for a vaccine, but there’s one group still waiting whose work impacts our daily lives and the food we eat.
Farmers and other agricultural workers don’t get a day off, and one farmer in Madison County says their immunity can end up impacting the amount of food we see on store shelves, which is what we saw at the beginning of the pandemic.
This time last year, store shelves were empty, food was limited, and milk was being poured out.
