Beef and sheep grazing school helps women set goals
Kelly Anderson and partners, including Extension, brought the GrazeHERs Grazing School to women in the livestock industry to learn about grazing lands. The group started their day at the Glenwood DNR office and continued at the farm of Anderson and her husband Bill, a beef operation near Glenwood.
Anderson has added a flock of sheep. “It’s my experiment, a smaller way, to practice what I preach about soil improvement and animal health,” she said.
Goal-setting is another area where Anderson is practicing what she preaches. Bringing together partners like the Minnesota Grazing Lands Conservation Association, Extension, Ducks Unlimited, the Minnesota Department of Agriculture (where she also works) and others equipped women with tools, ideas and a network to help them set and meet their goals.
Highlights
- 4-H Northern Lights Awards: Volunteer of the Year award honoree Julianne Hawkins leads programs in ways that build healthy youth-adult partnerships, ensuring youth have a voice and choice in decision making.
- 4-H youth helped host a “Breakfast on the Farm” with activities to give the public a taste of farm life, in collaboration with the Pope County Farm Bureau and the Malecha Farm Family.
- U of M Farm Family of the Year: The Bredeken Family, as Full Circle Farm, runs a microbakery and stewards 33 acres of small grains, growing heritage wheat, rye and other cover crops to prioritize soil health and biodiversity.
- University of Minnesota Extension was a partner at an educational event held at Rosholt Research Farm in August to highlight current research trials and practical innovations in soil health and nutrient management.
- The Climate Adaptation Partnership is making available new resources on future groundwater and soil moisture conditions for Pope County, allowing communities to address issues such as irrigation and drinking water availability based on long-term precipitation changes. Residents in Pope County are using the Climate Adaptation Partnership’s climate mapping and data tool, MN CliMAT, to access local climate projections for their communities.
- Extension provides financial capability education for participants in the judicial district’s treatment courts, including adult and juvenile drug courts, and courts for mental health, veterans, family dependency and DWI/DUI.
Pope County office
Extension has 14 regional offices supporting all 87 counties in Minnesota.
Pope County partners with Extension to deliver practical education and research you can use at home, at work and in your community. More about Extension in our county.
About the Minnesota 87 project
Spend time in any Minnesota county, and you will almost certainly encounter University of Minnesota Extension. Our faculty and staff, volunteers, participants, alumni and partners are woven into the fabric of rural, urban and suburban Minnesota life. This project showcases Extension in action through photos, stories and a sampling of the many ways Extension has touched the lives of people in every county.