He always wanted to become a farmer. While other kids his age were playing and having fun, he would be taking care of his chickens and learning as much as possible about livestock, a subject that fascinates him like no other. And here he is, more than a decade down the road making his dream of working on a farm come true. Meet Alex Bates, the new Farm Manager of Rapidan River Farm, in Charlottesville and a proud young farmer who believes that agriculture and farming is a solid job with a solid career prospect.
Free classes on Saturdays, hands on training, networking… Saturday On The Farm is attracting more and more people. There are those who are in the ag industry but who wish to enrich their knowledge and skillset, some want to look at the opportunities as a side gig and then there are others who have land and who want to learn how to farm on it. This is how the New Ag School’s fresh free initiative has been serving many ag purposes and building an ag community, one farmer at a time.
“We wanted to help with the project and honor Melanie’s memory the best we could. For forty years now, the Lucketts Ruritan Club has been following the National Ruritan organization’s motto of Fellowship, Goodwill and Community Service in and around Lucketts. It is in that spirit that the Club has partnered with the New Ag School in the Robert Brose Project.”
The rural team of Loudoun County’s Economic Development Department started a unique program a couple of years back. On opening day of the Major League Baseball season, in conjunction with the Loudoun County School system nutritional staff, they release a series of Farmer Trading Cards. The cards are distributed throughout the elementary schools in the county. The farmers featured, do a card signing and greet with the students on their way from the cafeteria.
Doug Fabbioli is concerned about the future of the rural economy, as urban sprawl expands from metropolitan areas into farm fields and pastureland. The Virginia winery owner decided to be part of the solution and founded The New AG School, the school’s mission is raising the next generation of farmers.
They’re calling it a school without walls, and after a pilot program, Loudoun farmers are ready to jumpstart the New AG School aimed grow the agricultural-business of Loudoun County.
The New AG School teaches agricultural leadership through agricultural skills and practices at Fabbioli Cellars in Leesburg.
Formally known as the Piedmont Educational Agriculture Center, Loudoun’s New Ag School (NAS) formally launched this week at Fabbioli Cellars just north of Leesburg. The school was awarded a grant of $9,000 by 100Women Strong, a philanthropic organization that pledges grants to help the Loudoun community.
How best to protect the area’s thousands of acres of farmland from development has been a decades-long debate in Loudoun County, often battled out in board rooms and late-night committee meetings.
Now, the men and women who lead some of the county’s most successful rural businesses say that part of the solution is found in raising up the next generation of farmers.
A free info guide from the Pesticide Education Program at the University of Kentucky Department of Entomology will help answer these questions and more when preventing the unwanted spread of applied pesticides on crops.