With an eye toward climate resiliency and new markets, Climate Land Leaders Naima Dhore and Wendy Johnson are diversifying their farming operations with small grains. For Naima, millet represents a return to a cultural food that is suited to grow in a changing Minnesota climate. For Wendy, Kernza holds great potential as a perennial crop…

This is a guest blog post from Lina “Mama Tshutshu” Nyaronge, Community Connector at Sharing Our Roots and Climate Land Leader. It is the final in a three-part series from Mama Tshutshu sharing perspectives on climate change, agriculture and community. In my Kenyan culture we have what we call a practice of unity. Unity is…

This is a guest blog post from Lina “Mama Tshutshu” Nyaronge, Community Connector at Sharing Our Roots and Climate Land Leader. It is the second in a three-part series from Mama Tshutshu sharing perspectives on climate change, agriculture and community. In my hometown of Kisii, Kenya, everyone has a backyard with vegetables – a kitchen…

This is a guest blog post from Lina “Mama Tshutshu” Nyaronge, Community Connector at Sharing Our Roots and Climate Land Leader. It is the first in a three-part series from Mama Tshutshu sharing perspectives on climate change, agriculture and community. At last, summer is here! As I write from my home in Northfield, we are…

Mary Swander’s new play, “Squatters on Red Earth” premieres this weekend—and Climate Land Leaders will be there to experience this performance that includes a tale of cooperation and also one of land theft. The play opens June 9, 8 pm at the Amana Performing Arts Center, Amana, Iowa, and June 10 at 2 and 7…

Climate Land Leader Meg Nielsen, who serves as a deacon in the South-Central Synod of Wisconsin (Evangelical Lutheran Church in America), wrote the following Care for Creation devotional in a recent synod newsletter. Thank you for sharing, Meg!

Much of the Midwest’s Corn Belt is productive only because of an underground network of drainage tubes known as tile. That tiling made lucrative row cropping possible but produces water quality issues like excess nitrates and other environmental problems. As Wendy Johnson has discovered, the tiling system is a challenge for establishing silvopasture, one of…

The Bouska sisters were recently honored as Winneshiek County Pheasants Forever Chapter Habitat Steward of the Year — congratulations! An equal honor, their conservation partner Brian Sauer with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources has dubbed them “Team Habitat.” In his remarks at the award presentation, Brian shared: “This year we are honoring the Bouska…

This piece is reprinted with permission from Beth Hoffman, author of Bet the Farm: The Dollars and Sense of Growing Food in America. Find Beth’s blog, In The Dirt, here. Somewhere around the turn of the new year I sent out an email that I was looking for projects.  I wrote to a few people…

“What sounds did you used to hear on the farm that you no longer hear?” a friend asked us recently. Climate Land Leaders quickly chimed in with answers that produced reveries of the farms of our childhoods. Here is a smattering of their responses. Meadowlarks in the pasture calling their mate. Mourning doves in the grove Pheasants and quail calling from the…