Beginning Farmer Workshops – Farmer Field School

Tweet

Fall Beginning Farmer Workshops – Michigan Farmer Field School Series

Coming this Fall (2015) – Michigan Farmer Field School Workshop Series brought to you by the MSU Student Organic Farm

September 14, 2015  8 am – 6pm 

Field Based Pest and Disease Management: For Sustainable Outdoor and Hoophouse Vegetable Production – Student Organic Farm – Lansing, Michigan.  Cost:  $150; After Sept 1, 2015 – $175  

Outcome goals: Participants will learn how to identify and scout for major pest and disease challenges to their farm, articulate management response to identified problems and become familiar with resources for problem-solving.

Includes: Overview of a systems approach to pest and disease management, identification and exploration of lifecycles and common thresholds for action for pests and diseases. Also includes hands-on response strategies, field training for hoophouse and field pest and disease scouting and helpful record keeping.

Presenters: Ben Werling – MSU Extension, Nicole Quinn – MSU Graduate Research Assistant, Vegetable Entomology Lab, Jeremy Moghtader – Farm Manager, MSU Student Organic Farm, Director MSU Organic Farmer Training Program

In October  – 1 day Workshop, Date TBA

Holistic Soil Management: Fertility, Cover Cropping, Weed Management and Tillage – Student Organic Farm – Lansing, Michigan.   Cost: $150; After Oct. 1, 2015 – $175

Includes: Proven strategies, planning, and tools at various scales for building and maintaining the healthiest soils while managing weeds prepping fields for crops.

In November – 1 day Workshop, Date TBA

Year Around and Seasonal CSA Success: Strategies and techniques for improving profitability and satisfaction  – Student Organic Farm – Lansing, Michigan.   Cost: $150; After Nov. 1, 2015 – $175

Additional Upcoming Workshops:

Business Planning – Finding and Focusing on Profitability (Jan/Feb 2016), Scaling Up your Farm Business (April/May 2016),  Planning for Better Pest and Disease Management(Feb./March 2016)

TO REGISTER FOR A WORKSHOP & KEEP INFORMED ABOUT THE FARMER FIELD SCHOOL:

For information on workshop details, upcoming workshops and the Michigan Farmer FieldSchool Series, or to register go to https://www.msuorganicfarm.org/farmer-field-school.html

For workshop Questions contact:

Megan DeLeeuw – Farmer Field School Program Manager 734-718-5506

Tom Cary – Farmer Field School Program Manager 616-916-9823

ABOUT THE FARMER FIELD SCHOOL –

The MSU Farmer Field School is comprised of intensive one and two day hands-on workshops. They are tailored to deliver in-depth, practical information building on the decade of farmer training on-going at the MSU Student Organic Farm and the wealth of knowledge in Michigan’s farming community.

Experienced farmers and premier agriculture educators from our region are teaming up to co-lead and deliver workshops in the Farmer Field School. Each workshop also includes group-based learning processes where diverse approaches to farming challenges can be shared and discussed by both participants and workshop presenters and demonstrated at host farm sites. For the current cycle, workshops will take place on select farms in southern Michigan (erase comma) with a goal of expanding the workshops to other regions of the state as the program develops.

With an emphasis on vegetable production, the Field School is designed to help improve the profitability of diversified, sustainable, Michigan farmers in their first 10 years of farming who serve local and regional markets. The Field School is part of a broader vision and collaboration among statewide organizations including the MSU Center for Regional Food Systems and Michigan Food and Farming Systems to help increase new farm success by working to make farming a more prosperous, secure, and sustainable career choice for the many beginning as well as future farmers here in Michigan– to keep farmers farming, farmland in production, and food local and regional.

This material is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under award number 2015-70017-22856.