Tune in Sat., July 1, 9-9:30AM Central for chat about Wisc Women in Conservation Week

It’s the first day of July and the sun’s shining. As the day warms up, I’m thinking about the day’s chores: fill the cattle trough with fresh water, water the new tree and shrub plantings, and check on the health of the native herbs that grow across our pastures and down by the brook.

Kriss Marion

Those native plants are a significant asset on our farm, and we’re working to preserve and encourage them. Lots of other farmers are doing the same.  This morning, on Deep Roots Radio we’ll chat with Kriss Marion to learn how the Wisconsin Women in Conservation works to encourage conservation measures on land owned and farmed by women in Wisconsin.

 

 

We’ll also learn why Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers has proclaimed July 10-16 Wisconsin Women in Conservation Week, and for the third year in a row! There’ll be lots of celebration going on that’s free and open to the public.

Please join us today, July 1st, 9:00-9:30AM Central Time, by dialing in to 93.1FM in and around Amery, WI, or www.wpcaradio.org worldwide.

Event barn owner says Wisconsin bill AB304 will cripple venue

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Agritourism
Agritourism
Event barn owner says Wisconsin bill AB304 will cripple venue
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Earlier this month, Wisconsin legislators introduced a bill to the Assembly to overhaul the state’s liquor laws. Unfortunately, this proposal contains language that would severely limit the ability for family farms to rent space for celebrations, such as weddings.  Here’s a link to the AB 304 language that’s posing the deep concern.

In this Deep Roots Radio chat with Sara Hasse, owner and operator of Croix View Event Barn in Osceola, Wisconsin, she describes how this proposed legislation could knock the beams right from under family farms working to remain viable businesses in rural communities. She also looks at possible negative impact on other local businesses that benefit from these event venues.

I hope you enjoy this conversation.

Sylvia

Will Wisconsin proposed legislation cripple the state’s event barns? Listen in 6/17, 9-9:30AM Central

Last week, legislators introduced a bill to the Wisconsin Assembly to overhaul the state’s liquor laws. Unfortunately, this proposal contains language that would severely limit the ability for family farms to rent space for celebrations, such as weddings.  Here’s a link to the AB 304 language that’s posing the deep concern.

On tomorrow’s Deep Roots Radio show, we’ll chat with Sara Hasse, owner and operator of Croix View Event Barn in Osceola, Wisconsin. She’ll describe how this proposed legislation could knock the beams right from under family farms working to remain viable businesses in rural communities. We’ll also look at possible negative impact on other local businesses that benefit from these event venues.

Listen in: Saturday, June 17, 9:00-9:30AM Central on 93.1FM in and around Amery, WI, and worldwide on the internet at www.wpcaradio.org .

Sylvia

Kriss Marion on Wisconsin Women in Conservation as educators for all farmers

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Kriss Marion on Wisconsin Women in Conservation as educators for all farmers
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It’s not often you get in a room with over one hundred women educated, committed and experienced in farming and conservation of our soils and water. It doesn’t happen all the time, but it is occurring more and more as organization like the Wisconsin Women in Conservation bring the women, the issues and the opportunities to the challenges of restoring our soils, protecting our groundwater and encouraging all farmers across the state.

The Wisconsin Women in Conservation (WiWiC) is a state-wide collaborative effort led by the Michael Fields Agricultural Institute in partnership with Renewing the Countryside, Marbleseed (formerly MOSES), and the Wisconsin Farmers Union.

I hope you enjoy this Deep Roots Radio chat with Kriss Marion, a long-time powerhouse in efforts to empower farmers and women landowners to conservation efforts. Kriss is WiWiC’s Media and Communications Lead, Communication’s Specialist with the Wisconsin Farmers Union. She is a small-scale farmer using managed grazing practices with her cattle, goats and sheep. Kriss and her husband Shannon run the Circle M Farm BnB.

During our chat, Kriss described several upcoming meetings that’ll be a help to any woman farmer and landowner. They can be found on the WiWiC website.

Sylvia

 

Thorny Hawthorn, Part 3: EagleSong describes worldwide travels to visit helpful hawthorn trees

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Thorny Hawthorn, Part 3: EagleSong describes worldwide travels to visit helpful hawthorn trees
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In this Deep Roots Radio chat, herbalist EagleSong Gardener describes the many trips she’s made to England, Europe, Mexico, and across the USA in search of hawthorn trees – a not-very-tall but very thorny tree that has helped cultures with food and natural remedies for hundreds of years. I’m so glad EagleSong visited the hawthorn thickets on my farm, Bull Brook Keep, in fall 2022. I use them for heart-healthy teas and tinctures.

Eagle Song Gardener and hawthorn fruit

This podcast is the third in a series of three with EagleSong about hawthorn. The first focused on how to identify this hedgerow plant, and the second looked into ways to use it in the kitchen and in your apothecary.

You can find out lots more about EagleSong’s work, lessons and products on her website, at herbal medicine conferences all across the US, and on her Youtube channel, @eaglesonggardener1893.

I hope you enjoy this interview.

Sylvia

Beautiful. Frozen. Blinding and brutal.

Bull Brook Keep

January 26, 2023

The glare off the pastures can send you into snow-blindness in just seconds. The entire farm is nothing but rolling white and blue shadows. It’s still. Snow crystals glitter. It’s a glorious view from this side of the living room windows. The bird feeders hang sad, nearly empty, nagging me to pull on hat, boots and coat, and do the right thing. In a bit.

Each dog has claimed a sunny patch and will remain inert for as long as the sun warms his coat. The only thing that’ll bring their heads up is the rustle of the plastic bag holding the raisin rye bread.

It’s 14 degrees, which means we’re already on the downward slope from today’s projected high of 19. My phone’s weather app forecasts a high of just 2 degrees in a few days; and that after a night crawling to -11.  Grrr.

Learning how to dress for the winters of the Upper Midwest was a life-changing lesson when I moved from New York City to the shores of Lake Superior. I was in my early 20s and landed in Duluth with one heavy wool coat. I loved that coat, but quickly discovered it would not protect me from snows off the lake, or the icy winds that blasted down the hills. One of the first things I did was find a local Army surplus store and buy a huge parka.  It was bright orange, had a massive fur-trimmed hood, and I  didn’t care that I looked like a highway worker. I felt invincible as crossed open fields, climbed into ore carriers, and visited local leaders to get interviews and film for KDAL-TV’s evening news shows. I came to appreciate why my newsroom friends had several coats and jackets to deal with the wide range of temperatures thrown at us throughout the year.

Siggy loves the snow

I left the newsroom decades ago, and I don’t know what happened to that parka. However, warm coats remain a priority as I tend to our small cattle herd. The deep cold freezes the brook. This year, episodes of rain, sleet, drizzle and fog are building layers of ice over dense layers of snow, over rock-hard sheets of ice on every field and road surface. Cars slip and skid. I wear cleats over my boots just to get to the mailbox. It’s awesome, and unforgiving.

But right this minute, I’m grateful for its beauty, the warmth of my home, and for the bright shafts of sunlight traveling across the floor. Time for another cup of chai tea.

Sylvia 

Part 2: Eagle Song Gardener on using Hawthorn for delicious health

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Part 2: Eagle Song Gardener on using Hawthorn for delicious health
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I hope you’ll enjoy this second conversation with herbalist Eagle Song Gardener about the many ways we can use the thorny Hawthorn in foods and herbal medicines.

Eagle Song has traveled the world to learn about the adaptable and ever-helpful hawthorn tree. In this Deep Roots Radio interview, we chat about the many, many ways the very thorny Hawthorn can find its way to our tables, salads, lunch boxes and remedies.

In case you missed it, please enjoy our first chat in which Eagle Song introduced us the the hawthorn, a tree with many hundreds of species.

Sylvia

Winter activities and adventures on Wisconsin family farms.

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Winter activities and adventures on Wisconsin family farms.
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We love visiting farms during warm weather. But what about when the snow’s 2 feet deep and there are ice crystals in the air?

Winter’s a perfect time to enjoy great food, family activities and adventure on Wisconsin family farms. In this Deep Roots Radio interview, Sheila Everhart, Executive Director of the Wisconsin Agricultural Tourism Association, describes just how easy it can be to have fun and create lasting memories on any one of the scores of farms that regularly welcome visitors to their operations.

Find your next ag-adventure

I hope you enjoy this interview, and I urge you to visit the Wisconsin Agricultural Tourism Association website to find your next ag-adventure, www.wiagtourism.com.

 

PS. You’re invited to visit my farm, Bull Brook Keep, for an afternoon of snowshoeing or cross-country skiing. Just give me a call, 651-238-8525.

Sylvia

How deep is deep snow?

How deep is deep snow?

Siggy, the farm dog

Six inches if you’re a Corgi. Siggy loves it!

 

 

Enjoy the fluffy cold! Come visit. Snowshoes and cross-country skiis welcome. Just call.

Sylvia

EagleSong describes a helpful, if thorny, tree in your neighborhood.

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Deep Roots Radio
EagleSong describes a helpful, if thorny, tree in your neighborhood.
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Hawthorn trees grow all across our farm, Bull Brook Keep. The ubiquitous Crataegus species is found all over North America and Europe, producing fragrant blossoms in the spring and firm red fruit — haws — in late summer and fall.

Buelingos and hawthorn

I came to recognize hawthorn – which on my farm grows as a tall, scraggly shrub – as I rotated my beef herd from field to field throughout the grazing season. My Buelingo cows shaded themselves under the scruffy trees and sometimes browsed on the lower leaves.  I simply enjoyed their lovely pale pink flowers, but eventually became curious about the small red fruit – the size of a small crab apple. As it turns out, they are in the larger apple family.

Thorns from 1-2″ long

As I continue my herbal studies, I’ve came to learn hawthorn flowers and fruit have been used in herbal remedies and tonics for hundreds of years. And here there were, growing all across my farm! Yippee! Since then, I’ve gathered hawthorn for making tinctures and teas that support heart health, and lots more.

 

 

 

Eagle Song

EagleSong Gardener is an herbalist who has come to know and use hawthorn deeply for decades. She’s a lovely woman I met at a Wisconsin herbalists’ conference in September 2022. EagleSong has traveled the world visiting hawthorn hedges and conversing with the many men and women who have come to appreciate this amazing woody gift on our landscape. Fortunately for me, she visited Bull Brook Keep on her way back to her home state of Washington.

 

I hope you enjoy this interview, the first in a three-part series with this knowledgeable and enthusiastic teacher. You can also find EagleSong’s lessons on her website, Facebook, and many helpful videos on Youtube.

Sylvia