Other News.... Climate Change and Drought!

Well there's been lots of other news and neat stories I've read and heard lately... I'll see which ones I can find. But for the time being we'll have to go with the news on hand at my fingertips and the major piece being that Associated Press on down are talking about the drought. It is a major drought to be sure. All of the farmers I know from local produce farmers, local commodity farmers, to the farmer who leases our hay fields is talking about the drought, and scrambling for ways to get more water to their crops - assuming they have any left after our early 80 degree mini-summer we had first part of March. One thing that has been irking me is the news coverage suggesting that produce and vegetable prices won't really be going up because they are already irrigated in California's central valley. Well I got news for these reporters, while it is true that currently most of the nation's fruits and vegetable do come from California, it is certainly not all, and there is a trend toward local production. And many of the rest, like local fruit and vegetable growers here in Michigan, don't solely rely on irrigation. (Incidentally, I will leave aside that water and irrigation in California's central valley is highly likely to have a stressful future since that in itself is a lengthy topic.) So I don't know anyone whose cost of production didn't go up this year and whose volumes weren't cut due to lack of water. This suggests to me that fruit and veggie prices are up, will be up, and should be up, in the local economies of which I choose to be a part. I don't see any way the average US citizen will have to use more than the average 13% of their income on food this year and into next year and perhaps into the future (are they trying to not panic us by saying otherwise?). Anyway, this graphic that shows maps of official drought conditions each year from 1896 to 2012 caught my eye in this recent NYTimes article about the drought.



On a more upbeat (and whoa are people actually watching?) note was this recent article in the NYTimes about a new "profit model" being demonstrated by "small-scale-farmers"!

Farm News

Well once again the blog has gone neglected. What can I say, that's what happens when you have a farmer wearing a lot of different hats. But there is good reason for the lack of postings and that is a major announcement. Brines Farm has expanded, purchasing a historic 80 acre farm around the corner from our existing farm in northern Webster Township. We are so excited, so overwhelmed, and so humbled to be the proud new stewards of a beautiful piece of earth which had a long history in the lineage of one family the previous 150 years or so. The land feels like the definition of pastoral with its gently rolling open spaces and one of the freshest tributaries to the Huron River - Arms Creek - bisecting the middle of the farm. Needless to say every ounce of spare time has gone into getting to know this land, beginning to lay out our plans to work with nature, and planting a selection of fruit & nut trees and shrubs as well as some summer produce. Stay tuned for more stories and tales from Brines Farm @ Arms Creek Valley (and of course continued stories from Brines Farm @ Donovan Mountain Hollow)!

For now here are some photos below. If you click on them you get a booklet of 37 photos from around the farm boundary.