Reading Time: < 1 minute Are you headed to the field? So are we! Country Guide is all digital, all summer. We’ve got stories from farmers across the country who share their insights about how to meet the challenges and opportunities of today’s agriculture industry. We’ve got advice from Canada’s top ag experts on topics to grow your business. We’ll […] Read more
Welcome to our Summer Series!
This old land: Where is farming in Quebec headed?
[The Rent Shake-Up: Quebec] Quebecers have been farming in la belle province for over 400 years. So how about 400 years from now?
Reading Time: 9 minutes In a province where only two per cent of its land is suitable for agriculture, Quebec has been losing cropland to the province’s expanding cities at the rate of 12 football fields every day, and it has been losing farmland at that speed for nearly three decades. Even now, says Quebec’s UPA, its main farm […] Read more
The Subtle Art of Not Giving a …
Guide Books Review: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life
Reading Time: 3 minutes The Subtle Art of Not Giving a … A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good LifeBy Mark Manson Let’s start with a warning to would-be readers of this book: if you’re offended by f-bombs and a few other swear-y words, you’ll want to give it a miss. But if you choose to read The Subtle […] Read more
Mindset: Changing the way you think to fulfil your potential
Guide Books Review: Creating a 'culture of development' is essential
Reading Time: 3 minutes Mindset: Changing the way you think to fulfil your potentialBy Dr. Carol S. Dweck Failure can be difficult to handle, especially if you’ve always been told that you are smart. Failure can also be problematic if you feel that everything you do will always be deeply scrutinized and evaluated. It’s all on you. Worse, you […] Read more
Getting Along: How to Work with Anyone (Even Difficult People)
Guide Books Review: How having even one difficult person can ruin an entire team
Reading Time: 4 minutes By Amy GalloHarvard Business Review Press Farming is seldom a solo venture. Not only do the older and the younger generations overlap but as farms get bigger and more complex, more employees get hired too, so learning to work with others is essential. Negative relationships are bad for business. We know this, but there’s still […] Read more
Temple Grandin’s Guide to Working with Farm Animals
Guide Books Review: Safe, Humane Livestock Handling Practices for the Small Farm
Reading Time: 3 minutes Temple Grandin’s Guide to Working with Farm Animals: Safe, Humane Livestock Handling Practices for the Small FarmBy Temple GrandinStorey Publishing, 192 pages What if there was a way to get inside your animals’ brains to figure out what they’re thinking and why they act in the (frustrating!) ways that they do? You can do exactly […] Read more
Great books to give as a gift for Christmas
Guide Books Review: With the season just around the corner, here are my four ideas for the farm-business reader on your list
Reading Time: 3 minutes Everything is FigureoutableBy Marie Forleo If there’s one thing farming is lousy with, it’s those “head scratchers” that stop you in your tracks until you figure things out. Forleo’s book is based on the premise that every challenge has a solution and that everything is “figureoutable.” Her approach helps you counter the thoughts that act […] Read more
The Outward Mindset
Guide Books Review: How to Change Lives and Transform Organizations
Reading Time: 3 minutes The Outward Mindset: How to Change Lives and Transform OrganizationsThe Arbinger InstituteBerrett-Koehler Publishers Do you ever think about how you think? I know it sounds flighty at first but it really is important because the way you think — whether it’s with an outward or an inward mindset — can determine the success of your […] Read more
The problem with solving problems
Bright Ideas: We all think we're great at solving problems on the farm. The truth is, it isn't so hard to get a lot better
Reading Time: 5 minutes There are right ways and wrong ways to solve problems. This is a fact. It’s real. Fortunately, though, problem-solving is a learnable skill. We can all get better at it. The Oxford dictionary defines a problem as “a matter or situation regarded as unwelcome or harmful and needing to be dealt with and overcome.” Meanwhile, […] Read more
Getting from good to great
Guide Books Review: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’t
Reading Time: 3 minutes Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’tBy Jim CollinsHarper-Collins Most business books are written for non-farm businesses. The advice in this book, however, is generally transferable to a farm business context. After all, as I frequently explain to non-farmers who want to understand how a modern farm is run, business […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
