Tax changes for growers
by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
Ever-changing tax codes challenge business owners, including growers. That’s why AmericanHort recently presented “Cracking the Code on Taxes that Affect Your Green Industry Business.” (more…)
Need a new search?
If you didn't find what you were looking for, try a new search!
Wholesale offers small farms additional revenue stream
by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
Could wholesale help your fruit and vegetable farm sell more? Michigan State University Extension offered “Wholesale for Beginning Farmers” as a webinar recently. Jae Gerhart, a Michigan State Extension agent specializing in community food systems, presented. (more…)
Get more for your farm’s goods
by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
Value-added items can boost the bottom line of your farm’s store or your booth at the farmers market. It’s never been a better time to make value-added items. Many more Americans have become discerning consumers about their food choices. They want to know their food’s source. (more…)
Labor issues challenge diverse lawn business
by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
For Bill and Jennifer LaPlant, 24 hours in one day just doesn’t seem enough. While Bill operates LaPlant’s Lawn & Property Maintenance — mowing, trimming, snow plowing and maintaining more than 100 commercial and residential properties — Jennifer runs the couple’s garden center and greenhouse business in Lyons, NY, where they sell numerous varieties of plants, hanging baskets, bark mulch, gifts, local products and garden supplies. (more…)
Diversity Helps Gro-Moore Farms Thrive
by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
Staying diverse has helped Gro-Moore Farms in Rush, NY stay profitable and pass down the family farm to subsequent generations. Jack and Kathy Moore, Jacks’ brother George and his wife Brenda run the circa 1917, 800-acre operation. (more…)
High efficiency maximizes grower’s profits
by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
Grossing $350,000 from 1.2 acres of growing space seems incredible to many operators. For Conor Crickmore, owner of Neversink Farm in Claryville, NY, it’s all a matter of achieving optimal efficiency without using tillage or tractors. (more…)
Septuagenarian embraces green thumb
by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
Age truly is a number for Patricia Rickard, 76, a Baldwinsville, NY resident whose contemporaries are mostly retired. She tried that once. She operated Korros, which taught performing arts to children with hearing impairment. But as her encore career, she founded PAR Horticulture Consulting Business. (more…)
Long Acre Farms: 20 years of telling customers ‘get lost’
by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
Creating an agritourism destination isn’t all fun and games — though it’s certainly helpful to provide a huge variety of fun and games. Developing Long Acre Farms from a produce and crop farm to an agritourism site that draws visitors from hundreds of miles around has taken 25 years. (more…)
Barcodes improve vegetable breeding process
by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
Barcodes can help vegetable plant breeders stay better organized and be more efficient. Michael Mazourek, the Calvin Knoyes Keeney associate professor of Plant Breeding for Cornell University, presented “Getting Started with Barcode-based Digital Data Collection for Vegetable Breeding”, a recent webinar hosted by eXtension, National Institute of Food and Agriculture and USDA. (more…)
Apple breeding adventures
by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
GENEVA, NY — “Variety is the spice of life” as the saying goes, and it’s the key to profitability in the apple growing business — if you develop and grow the right varieties. Susan Brown, professor horticulture section at Cornell University, presented “Adventures in Apple Breeding and Genetics” recently at Cornell in Ithaca, NY and via videoconference at Cornell’s Geneva Experiment Station in Geneva, NY. (more…)
