OSU Small Farm program to host March conferences

By TONY NYE

nye.1@osu.edu

Ohio State Uni­ver­sity Exten­sion Small Farm Pro­gram will host two con­fer­ences in March ded­i­cated to assist­ing small farm landowners.

The mis­sion of the OSU Small Farm pro­gram is to pro­vide a greater under­stand­ing of pro­duc­tion prac­tices, eco­nom­ics of land use choices, assess­ment of per­sonal and nat­ural resources, mar­ket­ing alter­na­tives, and the iden­ti­fi­ca­tion of sources of assistance.

Ohio State want to help farm fam­i­lies improve eco­nomic growth and devel­op­ment on their farms. To help small farm landown­ers and fam­i­lies diver­sify their oppor­tu­ni­ties into suc­cess­ful new enter­prises and new mar­kets. And to improve the agri­cul­tural lit­er­acy among small farm landown­ers that have not been engaged actively in agri­cul­tural pro­duc­tion in the past.

These inten­sive con­fer­ences will give par­tic­i­pants the oppor­tu­nity to choose from a diverse vari­ety of sem­i­nars that can help them be suc­cess­ful in their farm­ing operations.

The first con­fer­ence is the 5th annual “Open­ing Doors to Suc­cess” Small Farm Con­fer­ence and Trade Show to be held March 8 and 9 at Wilm­ing­ton Col­lege located in Wilm­ing­ton, Ohio. The con­fer­ence will fea­ture approx­i­mately 30 break­out ses­sions and a trade show for small farmers.

The con­fer­ence kicks off on Fri­day, March 8 at 5:30 p.m. with an infor­ma­tive ses­sion: “Oppor­tu­ni­ties and Chal­lenges to Run­ning a Suc­cess­ful Small Farm Oper­a­tion” which will embrace inter­ac­tions between pre­sen­ters and audi­ence. A Panel of Area Pro­duc­ers will address such issues as labor, financ­ing, cus­tomer rela­tions, agri­tain­ment, and more.

On Sat­ur­day, March 9, reg­is­tra­tion begins at 7:45 a.m. and the day will con­clude at 3:45 p.m. The day will fea­ture approx­i­mately 30 break­out ses­sions offered through­out the day and will cover a vari­ety of top­ics that will include such exam­ples as: Bee Keep­ing; Ver­mi­cul­ture; Veg­etable Nutri­ent Man­age­ment; Gen­er­at­ing Energy for the Small farm; Uti­liz­ing Maps and Apps Tech­nol­ogy to Mar­ket Your Busi­ness; Christ­mas tree Pro­duc­tion; Cover Crops; Graft­ing of Trees; Cheese Mak­ing; Prepar­ing and Sell­ing Food Prod­ucts – Rules, Reg­u­la­tions, and Legal Lia­bil­ity; Laven­der Pro­duc­tion; Raised Bed Pro­duc­tion; Pas­ture Man­age­ment; Select­ing a Live­stock Enter­prise for a Small Farm; Fer­ti­ga­tion of Toma­toes; SARE Grants and Resources; Greenhouse/Tunnel Pro­duc­tion; Food Safety; Agri­cul­tural Law Con­sid­er­a­tions; Devel­op­ing Water Sys­tems for Pas­tures; Grow­ing Hops; Mar­ket­ing; Finan­cial Man­age­ment; Dis­ease Man­age­ment of Fruits and Veg­eta­bles; Pro­ducer pan­els and so much more.

Reg­is­tra­tion is $20 on March 8, $50 on March 9 or $60 for both days. Reg­is­tra­tion dead­line is March 1. For more infor­ma­tion, log on to: http://clinton.osu.edu under county events, or con­tact OSU Exten­sion edu­ca­tor Tony Nye at nye.1@osu.edu or 937–382-0901.

The third annual “Liv­ing Your Small Farm Dream” East­ern Ohio Small Farm Con­fer­ence and Trade Show will be held on March 23, 2013 at the Musk­ingum County Con­ven­tion & Wel­come Cen­ter, from 8:30 a.m. until 4:15 p.m. in Zanesville, Ohio.

The con­fer­ence will begin with a keynote address, “Plan­ning and Goal Set­ting”, pre­sented by Mike Hogan, OSU Exten­sion fol­lowed by over 20 break­out ses­sions atten­dees can pick and choose from.

Exam­ples of break­out ses­sions at this con­fer­ence will include: maple syrup, sheep pro­duc­tion, goats health and pro­duc­tion, for­ages, live­stock nutri­tion, direct mar­ket­ing of meat, social media, Christ­mas trees, legal issues for your small farm, soil basics, goats, bram­bles, high tun­nels, bee­keep­ing, veg­eta­bles and financing/loans, where to get addi­tional assis­tance, and much more.

Reg­is­tra­tion is $50 per per­son. Reg­is­tra­tion dead­line is March 18th. For more infor­ma­tion log on to: http://muskingum.osu.edu , http://clinton.osu.edu , or con­tact OSU Exten­sion edu­ca­tor Mark Mech­ling at mechling.1@osu.edu or 330–324-6341.

These two con­fer­ences are co-sponsored by OSU Exten­sion Small Farm Pro­gram; Farm Credit Mid-America; and the U.S. Depart­ment of Agri­cul­ture offices of the Farm Ser­vice Agency, Nat­ural Resources Con­ser­va­tion Ser­vice, National Agri­cul­ture Sta­tis­tic Ser­vice and Rural Development.

If you would like more infor­ma­tion about this please con­tact Tony Nye at 937–382-0901 or Email at nye.1@osu.edu.

(L. Tony Nye is the Agri­cul­ture and Nat­ural Resources Edu­ca­tor, OSU Exten­sion, Clin­ton County.)

Posted by Tina Murdock on Feb 24 2013. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.