Managing Biodiversity on the Farm: Soil, Habitat, and Agroforestry in Practice

This interactive workshop, held on an active organic apple orchard at Flagg Hill Farm, will introduce producers to practical strategies for improving biodiversity within working farm systems, with a focus on integrating conservation and production goals. 

Participants will engage with a newly developed best practices tool and field guide to assess and enhance habitat and protect natural resources. 

Breaking the Lawn: Sowing Resilience in the Subdivision

Conventional subdivisions present a unique set of challenges for ecological landscaping— compacted (often clay) soils, neighborly optics, and monocultures of lawn and Home Depot shrubbery. 

Join Brett Towle, ecological designer and owner of Dicot Landscape Studio, for a field-based exploration of how to assess and implement ecology-forward plantings in everyday neighborhoods, with real budgets and real constraints. It's not about eliminating your lawn, but finding the right amount of it. 

Building Biodiversity: Habitat, Soil, and Pasture Regeneration

This interactive workshop at Choiniere Family Farm will introduce practical strategies for improving biodiversity on working farms using a newly developed field guide for organic producers. 

With expertise from farmers and in partnership with Audubon VT, participants will be introduced to a best practices tool and accompanying field guide to assess and enhance habitat on their farms for birds and other wildlife. 

Farm Stand Sales Strategies: Merchandising, Collaboration, and Customer Experience

Learn how thoughtful design and smart planning can make a farm stand more inviting and profitable. This on-farm workshop covers effective merchandising, product mix, and ways to create a smooth, customer-friendly experience. 

We’ll explore partnering with other farms to broaden your offerings, as well as options for payment systems like SNAP and Farm Stand Match. Attendees will visit two nearby farm stands to compare different setups, including staffed and self-serve models. Walk away with practical ideas to strengthen your stand and better connect with customers.

Opportunities for Integrating Tree Crops with Grazing Systems

Diversity can be a powerful approach to increasing farm resilience. Adding agroforestry systems to your farm can diversify enterprises, provide alternative fodder, improve soil health, and increase water quality and resilience. 

Join Breadtree Farms, who manages 800 acres in the Upper Hudson Valley and Southwest Vermont, to learn how they are stewarding 20,000+ food-producing trees and shrubs—including chestnut, hickory, oak, seaberry, apple, pear, mulberry, and persimmon—in orchards grazed by sheep and cattle. 

Reading the Farm Landscape to Increase Water Resilience

Too much water in some places and not enough in others? Managing this common situation for Vermont farmers is becoming more important as the climate changes. Join farmer Makail Tipton and UVM’s Joshua Faulkner, Director of UVM Extension’s Center for Sustainable Agriculture, for an afternoon at Firefly Farm at Burke Hollow to understand how soils and landscape influence drainage issues and water supply constraints.