Entries from February 2008

February 29, 2008

plugging rampfest

The Land Connection is a great organization here in Illinois. They work to, “establish successful farmers on healthy farmland, ensuring an abundance of delicious, local, and organic foods.” Every year they have a fund raiser called RampFest. Ramps are a wild leek. More HERE if you’re interested. It’s the first thing to pop up [...]

February 26, 2008

there is hope for this world

This is a fantastic story. Watch and enjoy…

February 26, 2008

nop to be reorganized

Source: Organic Consumers Association — I’m not privy to the inner workings of the USDA’s National Organic Program, but I just called the NOP office and they did confirm that this is happening. No word yet on when it will actually take place. Reorganization could be good or bad. The person I spoke with said [...]

February 25, 2008

live-blogging at upper midwest organic conference WRAP UP

Indiana Certified Organic
OK, this “live-blogging” thing is harder than it looks. In fact, what I’ve done here probably doesn’t even qualify as “live.” I tried to keep up, but it took so much time (for me) to write the posts and download the pictures, that I ended up spending more time blogging than conference-ing. [...]

February 25, 2008

organic fertilizers help mitigate climate change

Source: ENN — This just out! Climate modelers are starting to include farming practices into climate change models. Here now is more evidence that conventional ag fertility decreases soil organic matter and reduces the soil’s capacity to sequester carbon, whereas organic fertilizers (compost, manures, cover crops) increase soil organic matter and likewise the soil’s capacity [...]