Search Results

Keyword search: farm

By MADISON SCHOFIELD

HAWLEY — After 25 years running Sidehill Farm, founders Paul Lacinski and Amy Klippenstein are moooving on.

By JIM SIMON

While many of the legacy farmers markets in the Valley have been in existence for decades and have dozens of vendors with thousands of customers in a single day, there are many smaller markets that hold their own and help form deep connections in their communities. The Great Falls Farmers Market is one such market, serving as an essential connector for consumers with limited access to fresh food and for farms looking for places to sell their products.

By CHRIS LARABEE

WASHINGTON — The federal lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Agriculture and President Donald Trump filed by Red Fire Farm and other organizations over frozen government money will move forward, as a judge in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia has laid out a schedule of further proceedings.

By CLAIRE MORENON

The Barstow family has been producing milk in Hadley since the 1920s – and after nearly 90 years, they knew they had to make some changes if they wanted to stay in the dairy business.

By LAURA SPENCER

It didn’t take long in my time volunteering with Grow Food Northampton to be struck by just how many ways they show up for our community. During early morning shifts, the Community Farm staff guided us in harvesting produce like radishes, kale, garlic, and tomatoes that would be sent to local food pantries and cooked into healthy meals. I watched Molly, the education manager, bring school kids into the strawberry patch for a botanical scavenger hunt, and witnessed the children’s delighted faces when they were each allowed to pick one juicy red fruit right off the vine, all of them asking for more. I signed up for free classes about permaculture and soil health and how to tend to our gardens in the time of climate change.

By GRACE CHAI

NORTHAMPTON — A majority of one of the largest remaining unprotected farms in the city is now conserved for agriculture and wildlife habitat, thanks to a unique conservation effort that taps into federal funding.

By LISA GOODRICH

The Smiarowski family name has been a fixture in Valley farming since around 1923 when Alexander Smiarowski came from Poland, and purchased farmland in Montague for a dairy, along with cucumbers, asparagus and corn.

By LISA GOODRICH

When farming is in the family, the land calls no matter where else life takes you. Aaron Moody, owner-operator of Moody Family Farm, was born in Greenfield, and from the beginning, he knew that he loved working with animals. Three generations of Moody’s family farmed, and young Moody occasionally worked at his uncle’s dairy farm while growing up.

By SAMUEL GELINAS

HATFIELD — Darryl Williams is a rich man by many metrics. He owns a small dairy farm that covers almost 200 acres of land that has been in his family consecutively since 1661, and he is watching the next generations grow up as his nine young grandchildren get dirty around the farm.

By JACOB NELSON

“It’s usually around April 20 when I plant things in the field that can handle light frost,” says farmer Dan Greene of Good Bunch Farm. “Then there’s about a longer wait until the next big planting date in late May. By then the threat of frost is gone and you can finally plant all the warm-loving crops. After that, you really don’t have any time except for weeding and harvesting.”

By COLIN A. YOUNG

A recommendation from a task force the Legislature created a decade ago has resurfaced before the Revenue Committee, which took testimony earlier this month related to the machinations involved when a farm wants to use a portion of its land to generate both renewable electricity and supplemental income.

By JACOB NELSON

In many ways, farming can seem like a romantic way of life. “Being outside, providing for yourself, providing for your community – and the health changes I saw in myself, eating fresh food from the land – it all resonated so deeply,” says Cara Zueger, who runs Free Living Farm in Petersham with her husband Michael.

By JACOB NELSON

Spring is here, and with it are signs of new life on farms around the Valley. Leaves are beginning to bud on fruit trees, farmers are preparing soil for the coming growing season, and at Little Brook Farm in Sunderland, day-old baby lambs are bounding around the lambing barn.

By ERIN-LEIGH HOFFMAN

BOSTON — The state Department of Environmental Protection is fining Falls Farm, which has property in Montague and Sunderland, for violating the Massachusetts Wetlands Protection Act and Massachusetts Clean Water Act.

By CHRIS LARABEE

WASHINGTON — As federal dollars continue to be frozen for projects across the nation, a Pioneer Valley farm has joined a federal lawsuit demanding the government lift the “unlawful and indefinite freeze of congressional appropriated funds,” according to documents filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

By CHRIS LARABEE

BOSTON — As farmers prepare to head out to the fields for the season, Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resources Commissioner Ashley Randle sent a letter to the new U.S. agriculture secretary expressing concerns over uncertain federal funding and other actions taken by the federal government.

By LISA GOODRICH

“When people think of farms, they tend to think of the summer, abundance, corn fields, and flowers. What people don’t realize is that farms function year-round, and there are many business models that allow farmers to grow products year-round or have products year-round to sell,” says Hannah Logan, Market Manager of the Greenfield Winter Farmers’ Market.

By LISA GOODRICH

For local farmers, winter is a time for planning the next growing season, catching up on small business tasks, and maintaining structures and equipment. For the local community, winter is the time to lock in prices on produce for the growing season by signing up for Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) membership.

By CHINANU OKOLI

Applications are rolling in for the Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resources’ new Farm Transfer Planning Assistance initiative that connects aging farmers and their successors with experienced planners to set retirement goals and figure out how management and assets will be transferred.

By JACOB NELSON

Plenty of young kids tap a few maple trees, inspired by the sweet promise of maple syrup. Few become enamored with it to the point of kickstarting a family business. Cooper Deane, who helps run Bear Hill Sugar Farm, is one of them.

By EMILEE KLEIN

SPRINGFIELD — Most Massachusetts farmworkers whose hard work puts food on the dinner tables for Massachusetts families have difficulty affording the produce they pick and process.