How healthy is your farm? Check these vital stats to really know — not just guess — your farm’s fitness level
Reading Time: 8 minutes When your doctor puts you through a battery of tests, you learn exactly how much heavy lifting it’s smart to do. Otherwise, that bit of pain you think you felt last week might keep you in the house. Or you might ignore the pain as a fluke, and end your day in the back of […] Read moreFarm RX
Time to grow
With precision agriculture finally ready to fulfil its promise, should you look to expand even faster? The answer depends on whether you have the time
Reading Time: 5 minutes The predictions came fast and furious when relatively accurate GPS units first made their debut outside the military a decade ago. In essentially the twinkling of an eye, we were told, precision agriculture would begin slashing our use of inputs and we would apply only what we needed where it was needed, with medical precision. […] Read moreAn end to hunger
When Raj Patel begins speaking, I scan the audience at the Bring Food Home conference hosted by Trent University. This is clearly a crowd that loves food, and not just food, but the idea of food. So what’s this knot in my stomach?
Reading Time: 4 minutes At the podium Raj Patel shines. He is the definition of charisma. His hair is sexy, his British accent is sexy and his message is sexy. He’s like a movie star of social justice. Food is his stage. The dignified-looking woman sitting next to me actually sighs. I find out later she is a faculty […] Read moreYoung & In Motion
Reading Time: 5 minutes Melanie Sommers tears around the corner of her family s free-stall barn, jumps out of the tractor cab and pokes a hand out of her coveralls for a handshake. She s been cutting some fourth cut hay and is rushing to get it done before the fall rain sets in. The pressure is on, but […] Read more
Listening In
Reading Time: 8 minutes A generation ago, Sarah Wray might have gone looking for a farm organization to join. Maybe she would even have started a new club so beginning farmers such as she and her husband Logan could learn from others about getting off to a good start. Or she might have opened up a new branch of […] Read more
Better Than Gold
Reading Time: 7 minutes Farmland values are up again across the country, and with strong commodity prices, land prices seem sure to post sizeble gains well into the future. For farmers coming off two decades of tight margins, the strength in the land market is not only helping them sleep at night, it s actually giving them fun options […] Read more
Retire Easier
Reading Time: 6 minutes The very nature of farming can squash all of a farmer s best intentions for off-farm investing. Busy schedules, fluctuating incomes and the constant demand for new technology can each put the reins on even a modest plan. Yet for more farmers, off-farm investing is becoming an essential business strategy, both so they can inject […] Read more
CLICK AND PRINT
Reading Time: 9 minutes When there aren t enough hours in the day to even get all the essential jobs done, it s no surprise that writing job descriptions, drafting interview questions and carrying out performance reviews often plummets to the very bottom of the farm priority list. That doesn t make it wise, though. In fact, in a […] Read more
5 Questions To Ask Your Market Adviser
Reading Time: 8 minutes Markets can be overtaken by hype and emotion, says ag economist Al Mussell. The last thing you need is an adviser or broker who injects even more. Before the frustration sets you storming out the back door, chucking your smart phone into the field and yelling some words that you aren t even supposed to […] Read more
Breaking Through
Reading Time: 4 minutes Dan Doner s eyebrows jump when I mention May, 2003. Eight years later, the reaction is still there, and it s still easy to understand why. That May, a Canadian animal first tested positive for bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), taking control of Doner s business life just as it did for thousands of other livestock […] Read more