Straight From The Farmer's Mouth

(Well, from the Farmer's laptop technically.) Here's what agricultural producers around Alberta are doing with climate solutions to build successful and resilient farms and ranches.

Farmer's Blog

Passive Solar Greenhouses Without Borders – Freshpals Farms – Olds, AB

What makes Jianyi’s vegetables at Freshpal Farms so unique isn’t only a matter of taste: it’s how he grows what he loves. Jianyi cultivates vegetables 12-months of the year in a passive solar greenhouse – a greenhouse powered 100 per cent by the energy of the sun. Whereas conventional greenhouses rely on fossil fuels and artificial heat to warm through the winter, a passive greenhouse relies only on the sun. Jianyi runs the largest commercial passive solar greenhouse in Alberta.

Passive solar technology works to trap and store solar energy. Solar energy is released slowly to heat up the greenhouse, which creates optimal growing conditions so Jianyi’s thin-skinned tomatoes can thrive year-round – even in one of the most bitterly cold growing zones on the planet.

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Farmer's Blog

Experimenting with No-Till Regenerative Agriculture – Steel Pony Farms – Red Deer, AB

With no knowledge about food production prior to these experiences, my learning curve was exponential. I became familiar with field crops, beef, dairy, goat, sheep, pig, broiler, egg, honey, vegetable, and fruit production. By engaging in a diversity of production methods, I observed the impact these methods had on the plants and animals being produced. In general, I saw that when farmers prioritized soil biology, as opposed to short term yield increases through the use of synthetic chemicals, they created healthier farming systems, healthier plants, healthier animals, and more successful farms – in terms of a triple bottom line.

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Farmer's Blog

Intercropping: Experimenting for Diversity – Andy Kirschenman – Hilda, AB

Intercropping is something that I was first drawn to after reading articles about Colin Rosengren, a grain farmer who practices intercropping on his farm, Rosengren Farm, in southern Saskatchewan. Fifteen years ago, I first experimented with managing 20 acres of peas and canola, and have since tried different combinations almost every year. I have managed as much as 600 acres, and as little as zero in the years after that first try. I have experimented with different crops together and different seeding rates.

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Farmer's Blog

Investing in Solar Energy for Tomorrow – Vaudet Dairy

When the Growing Forward 2 (GF2) program came out in 2013, we started looking into what things they would approve for funding, to see if we could make any improvements to the farm. One of the key themes of GF2 was to ‘be proactive, increase productivity and advance sustainability.’ With fluctuating electricity rates and a deep concern for what the future prices would become, we did some research and turned our eye to solar panels.

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Farmer's Blog

Regenerative Farming – Greener Pastures Ranching

On all of the eroded grain land, we need livestock back out there, recycling nutrients back into the soil. That’s how nature had it planned. In any environment where there’s a dormant season, nature put a ruminant animal. A ruminant is a cow, a deer, a sheep, an elk, a goat, or an elephant. Ruminants have four stomachs and they basically decompose plant material with microorganisms and bacteria in the gut. If you have a dormant season in an environment, for example, winter in North America, the bugs die off and there’s nothing there to decompose the plant material that’s left over. Nature brings in a ruminant animal where the bugs have a place to work – except here, they’re working inside the stomach of the cow. In a rainforest environment, there’s no need for a ruminant because the material falls to the ground, decomposers can work in the soil all year round. But here, where we have a dormant season, we need ruminants.

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Farmer's Blog

Hope Beneath Our Feet – Kolby Peterson

Our farms must not only feed themselves, but the community surrounding them. Economies shrinking to a bioregional scale may just be the richest thing our communities can endeavour in. We can rejuvenate our rural communities, providing pride and purpose in meaningful work through growing grass roots and grassroots movements where young people see that greener pastures can be found right outside the farmhouse door. Let us know our neighbours, nourish one another, and build the communities we really want to live within.

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