Wayne County Soil & Water Conservation District
7312 Route 31 Lyons, NY 14489 / 315-946-7200
2022 Soil Health & Climate Resiliency Field Days
Join the New York Soil Health team and partner organizations at a soil health field day! The statewide event series will take place May-August 2022. For more information visit https://www.newyorksoilhealth.org/fielddays/#.YpZDFSzMKUk
As winter wanes and our thoughts turn to springtime, it’s time to think about nesting boxes for birds. Many cavity nesting birds scout out and select nest sites starting in late February through May, so now is the time to begin making preparations.
Nesting boxes are available year round.
Pictured: Mark Humbert, Senator Pam Helming, Jacob Flowers, Ethan Humbert, Steve Olson, Assemblyman Brian Manktelow, District Manager Lindsey Gerstenslager and Conservation Field Manager of Wayne County AEM programs, Ron Thorn
2019 Wayne County Soil and Water Conservation District’s Conservation Farm of the Year has been awarded to Humbert Farms because of their dedication and commitment to protect and conserve the natural resources within our community through the New York State Agricultural Environmental Management Program.
The family-run farm is located in the Town of Rose on Lakes Corners -Rose Valley consisting of 3400 acres of owned/rented property with the majority of the commodity in field crops.
The Humbert family, Mark, and son Ethan have participated in the implementation of several farm management projects to keep their farm on the forefront of conservation; working with neighboring farms to carry out crop rotation, crop cover, manure sharing, natural resource sharing, irrigation, and best management practices implementation. The farm utilizes minimal tillage conservation systems, green fertilization techniques, conservation crop cover for year-round protection of soil erosion and is consistently working to minimize their impact on central Erie Canal system and Greater Sodus Bay. These BMPs limit damage to the aquatic life and protect recreational uses of streams and waterways they flow into, providing community sustainability for the future.
The Humbert family has worked to update their Certified Nutrient Management Plan in an effort to help guide the farm for management of rotation of crops, effective manure application for crop production and management of other natural resources. They work in partnership with the USDA Natural Resource Conservation Service, USDA Farm Service Agency and the Wayne County Soil and Water Conservation District to further the benefits of land stewardship and conservation implementation, by managing their farm and providing a higher quality commodity while looking out for the health of the environment.
“The Humbert family exemplifies what good agricultural environmental management is to Wayne County and New York State, by their continued efforts to participate, demonstrate and educate local area farmers community members and leadership, says Lindsey Gertenslager, District Manager Wayne County Soil and Water Conservation District. “They continue to inspire all agricultural entities with a ‘Can-Do’ attitude, which leads to new opportunities for everyone.
Congratulations to Michael Stanyard of Cornell Cooperative Extension (CCE), the recipient of the 2016 Wayne County Agriculture Environmental Stewardship award Awarding stewardship effort from across the agriculture communities
This year has been a great year for conservation in the agricultural industry in Wayne County. The varying soil types because of water quality considerations sometimes restrict implementation of specific projects that will aid in farms continuing to run their businesses while being considerate environmental health. Many farms were able to implement projects simply because crops were able to be planted early to on time.
Over the past several years, the District has awarded an Agricultural Environmental Stewardship award to a member of the agricultural support community that goes above and beyond to continue to provide services and manage environmental issues, aid in dealing with the difficult years and lend a hand to other farms. The award was created to be given at a grassroots level, to individuals that strengthen the community.
This year’s award recipient was awarded to Michael Standard, Team Leader, Field Crops Specialist of the Northwest New York Dairy, Livestock & Field Crop Team, Cornell Cooperative Extension of Wayne County on Tuesday, December 20, 2016 with recognition by the County Board of Supervisors, located at Wayne County Court House Chambers, 26 Church Street, Lyons, NY 14489.
Mr. Stanyard has been supporting Wayne County agricultural communities while continuing to address environmental related issues including but not limited to: soil health, cover crops, integrated pest management, crop disease management, climate resiliency, commodity marketing research, crop typing, organization of technical Ag teams, agricultural business planning, discussion groups, agriculture water quality management and so much more.
He continues to be an active participate in the Wayne County Agriculture Advisory Committee for 5 years and has assisted farms in relation to USDA and Wayne County Soil & Water Conservation Programs through the local working group. He advisement is available and offers outreach for any community member or group that requests it. His continued interest in the world of insects has provided technical assistance in addressing issues within Wayne County. Because Mike is a resident of Wayne County, honoring him with this award is extra special, as he continues to take part in efforts of Agro forestry, and wildlife conservation planning, along with the continuation of education with the youth.
We honor Mike as the 2016 Wayne County Agriculture Environmental Stewardship recipient because of his dedication and continue passion for leading the Wayne County Agricultural Community into the future.
New York State Farm Service Agency
441 South Salina St., Suite 536
Syracuse, NY 13202
315-477-6300
www.fsa.usda.gov/ny
Contact:
Lynnette Wright
315-477-6309
Lynnette.Wright@ny.usda.gov
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Farm Service Agency (FSA) in New York State reminds farmers of federal farm program benefits that may be available to help eligible producers recover from recent drought.
Twenty-four New York counties recently received a Secretarial Disaster designation. There are 15 primary natural disaster counties, they are: Cayuga, Chemung, Erie, Genesee, Livingston, Monroe, Niagara, Ontario, Schuyler, Seneca, Steuben, Tioga, Tompkins, Wyoming and Yates; and nine secondary natural disaster counties: Allegany, Broome, Cattaraugus, Chautauqua, Cortland, Onondaga, Orleans, Oswego, and Wayne.
FSA offers disaster assistance and low-interest loan programs to assist agricultural producers in their recovery efforts following qualifying natural disasters, like drought. Available programs and loans include:
Producers must file a Notice of Loss for failed acres on all crops including grasses in a timely fashion, often within 15 days of the occurrence or when the losses become apparent. Producers of hand-harvested crops must notify FSA of damage or loss within 72 hours of when the date of damage or loss first becomes apparent. For more information on FSA programs, visit http://disaster.fsa.usda.gov.
For more information on disaster assistance programs and loans visit www.fsa.usda.gov/ or contact your local FSA Office. To find your local FSA county office, visit http://offices.usda.gov.
Reprinted from Cornell Small Farms Program NewsAs we move toward reopening our businesses and lives, we need to make sure we are prepared for doing things differently. Taking care of ourselves, our employees and our customers will require planning ahead to make sure we have COVID-19 safety in mind.
We are getting used to wearing our cloth face coverings in public, and maintaining 6-foot physical distance from others. These practices also apply to our farms, and when we are interacting with the public. Health and safety precautions, such as providing hand sanitizer for employees and the public, will take some planning ahead.
Below we share some important resources to help you plan. We will continue to update our farm resilience resource page as new information becomes available.
CCE has been working with the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets (NYSDAM) throughout the COVID-19 pandemic to find ways to assist farmers with continuing their operations while improving safety precautions.
Through CCE offices, the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets (NYSDAM) is distributing 500,000 face masks to essential farm workers across the state. Also being distributed is hand sanitizer, produced in New York State and secured by NYSDAM.
Across the state, CCE offices have mobilized to receive and distribute hand sanitizer and masks to New York farmers, free of charge. Farmers can contact their local CCE office to request masks and sanitizer for their employees and retail areas.
Meanwhile, the Cornell Farmworker Program is also working hard to protect farmworkers. Anyone can get involved with the #4HMaskTask to help make reusable cloth masks for communities in need. These collaborations are evolving and ongoing.
In New York State, there is an Executive Order on the use of face coverings to limit the spread of COVID-19. It mandates that “any individual who is over age two and able to medically tolerate a face-covering shall be required to cover their nose and mouth with a mask or cloth face-covering when in a public place and unable to maintain, or when not maintaining, social distance.”
The CDC recommends that these cloth face coverings should:
New York State has also issued guidance that all employees who interact with the public must wear cloth face coverings. You may have family members that are interacting with the public.
These recommendations apply to them, as well as those paid to work on the farm:
New York State’s guidance all states that we must observe a 6-foot physical distance from others. The virus is transmitted person to person through respiratory droplets, which is why this 6-foot physical distancing is so important.
As you prepare for employees and farm customers, you should:
Establish a cleaning and sanitizing standard operating procedure (SOP) for frequently touched surfaces, such as tables, scale platforms, registers, other electronics, chairs, cash boxes, hand rails and port-a-john handles. Write these down and implement them daily.
For an example SOP that you can adapt to your farm, check out the Sanitation and Postharvest Handling Decision Tree.
Follow this four-step process for cleaning and sanitizing high-touch surfaces:
Emphasize hand washing and sanitation as recommended for food safety in general.
Make sure you have an adequate stock of hand sanitizer:
Instruct employees on proper use of disposable gloves for when dealing with customers or when using gloves as PPE during sanitation practice:
Encourage employees to arrive each day wearing clean clothes. Also, encourage employees to wash their farm clothes separately from other clothes.
Taking these proactive steps will protect your team and your customers and create a positive experience on the farm during this pandemic.
The NYS Department of Agriculture and Markets has created an official COVID-19 resource page offering details and latest guidance as it relates to agriculture in the state.
The Cornell Small Farms Program is keeping a list of resources for farms to build resiliency through potential impacts from COVID-19.
The Cornell EDEN website is the hub of information for COVID-19 issues and resources.
The Cornell Ag Workforce is a great resource for updates on labor management issues and programs and policies related to ag workforce issues and COVID-19.
The Institute for Food Safety at Cornell University answers questions around the risks associated with food production with useful links to expert resources to ensure that a safe and robust food supply is maintained.
LYONS NY- Patricia (Pat) VanLare of Sodus N.Y, has been awarded the 2019 Wayne County Agricultural Environmental Steward award. The award was created at a grassroots level to recognize individuals that strengthen the Wayne County agriculture community while looking out for environmental sustainability. An agricultural steward is someone who is dedicated to being agriculturally minded, environmental and conversationally sound and having the balance for them both economically.
Pat VanLare has supported agriculture through her personal work, serving as a community advocate for local and sustainable family traditions and local environmental related issues in Wayne County. She supports local programs that educate people where what and how food reaches farm to table, NYS Envirothon and Sodus Central Schools as a home economics instructor. She has been an active participant in the Wayne County Pomona Grange, serving at the State and Regional Grange levels and a Board Member of the NYS Grange Museum for many years. Pat serves on the Wayne County Soil and Water Conservation District’s Board of Directors as Vice-President and sits on the Wayne County’s County Fair Advisory Board as a volunteer coordinator.
Pat’s continued effort helps to improve Wayne County’s ties to agriculture and the importance of family, local traditions, history and agricultural advocacy for food production, land stewardship and environmental issues. Her working knowledge of several agricultural organizations such as Farm Bureau, Grange, Soil and Water, and USDA help provide information to the local communities to help them address advocacy on a consistent and uniformed message.
“I have worked on the District Board of Directors with Pat and cannot think of a better recipient to receive this honor,” said Huron Town Supervisor Laurie Crane who was recently the recipient of the New York State Senate Helming’s Woman of Distinction award.
We honor Pat as the 2019 Wayne County Agriculture Environmental Stewardship recipient because of her dedication and continue the passion for leading the Wayne County Agricultural Community into the future. Thank you, Pat, congratulations!
The agricultural assessment program allows eligible farmland owners to receive real property assessments based on the value of their land for agricultural production rather than on its development value. Any assessed value which exceeds the equalized agricultural assessment on the land may qualify for a reduced tax assessment.
Landowners must apply through the local town assessor for an agricultural assessment. Further Information on Agricultural Districts can be found here, contact information for local assessors can be found here.
Do you qualify? Find out by visiting the Soil Group page, there you can find more information about the program and will be able to download a brochure. You may also call our office at 315-946-7200
New York State Agriculture Commissioner Richard A. Ball today announced more than $1.2 million has been awarded to the State’s Soil and Water Conservation Districts (SWCDs) to help 33 farms implement practices to protect the environment. Funding from two programs will help these farms to conserve water resources, reduce the impacts of climate change, and implement environmental plans needed to participate in the New York State Grown & Certified program.
Commissioner Ball said, “As we celebrate Earth Day today, we also celebrate the work our farms are doing to improve and green their operations. Our farmers, working with their SWCDs, have long been implementing best management practices that are helping to reduce their environmental footprint and combat climate change. The funding announced today will help nearly three dozen farms to use advanced technology to conserve water, protect the land, and prioritize our natural resources.”
High-Efficiency Irrigation Water Management Systems Program
Through the Efficiency Irrigation Water Management System program, the Department has awarded $675,668 to SWCDs for the installation of new or upgraded water irrigation systems on 20 farms. This will allow farms to improve or expand their use of water resources and, at the same time, protect the environment by using high-efficiency systems, particularly micro-irrigation systems, that strategically place irrigated water within the root zone of the target crop. The new systems will help farms to conserve water resources and reduce the impacts of climate change while improving their ability to maintain consistent farm yields. They can also be used to target and deliver nutrients to the plant, reducing pollution risks to water resources.
Funding for High-Efficiency Agricultural Irrigation Water Management Systems has been made available through the Environmental Protection Fund. The following SWCDs received funding on behalf of farms in their county:
Essex County SWCD, one farm
Jefferson County SWCD, two farms
Madison County SWCD, one farm
Orleans County SWCD, seven farms
Saratoga County SWCD, one farm
Schuyler County SWCD, one farm
Seneca County SWCD, one farm
Suffolk County SWCD, one farm
Wayne County SWCD, three farms
Wyoming County SWCD, one farm
Yates County SWCD, one farm
AEM Implementation for NYS Grown & Certified Program
Through this program, 13 farms were awarded $564,195 to help them implement environmental plans that are needed to participate in the NYS Grown & Certified program. The NYS Grown & Certified program recognizes New York farms that are committed to producing high-quality agricultural products with a focus on environmental responsibility through the Agricultural Environmental Management (AEM) program.
An AEM plan assists fruit, vegetable, specialty crop growers, and other farmers to produce foods and products using the highest environmental standards. It also helps farmers protect and improve New York’s natural resources, including water and soil quality.
Funding for the AEM Implementation for NYS Grown & Certified program has been made available through the Environmental Protection Fund. The following SWCDs received funding on behalf of farms in their county:
Niagara County, three farms
Orleans County, one farm
Schoharie County, one farm
Wayne County, eight farms
Chairman of the New York State Soil and Water Conservation Committee Dale Stein said, “The funding announced today will help our farms incorporate important practices into their daily operations to conserve and protect our natural resources. I thank our SWCDs for their work to help our farmers continue to steward the environment now and for our future generations on the farm.”
(reprinted from NYS Ag and Markets)
Beginning July 10, U.S. Geological Survey scientists plan to conduct fieldwork along a flood-impacted stretch of New York’s Lake Ontario shoreline, using unmanned aerial systems (also known as drones), pressure sensors that measure water elevation and special water-elevation gages designed for rapid set-up. The fieldwork, supported by the state of New York and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is designed to gather up-to-date information to help emergency managers track and respond to historic levels of flooding, and to collect new scientific data about coastal processes affecting the lake’s shoreline.
High waters on Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River have damaged hundreds of residential and commercial properties along the shoreline, leading New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo to declare a state of emergency in six counties around the lake. The flooding was caused by heavy rains that fell on the Lake Ontario basin, a 32,000-square-mile area that stretches between the U.S. and Canada, in April and May. The Army Corps of Engineers estimated that roughly four trillion gallons of rain water has flowed into Lake Ontario. The lake is now more than 30 inches above normal, the highest it has been since at least the 1950s.
“This hasn’t happened in nearly a generation, so state emergency managers have not had to respond to an event of this magnitude in the era of modern science and technology,” said E. Robert Thieler, director of the USGS’ Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center, which is collaborating with the USGS’ New York Water Science Center in this effort. “We will provide information and tools we’ve developed while working on ocean coast hazards, so that the state can have access to the latest science to inform their decision making.”
Hydrologists from the USGS’ New York Water Science Center will install 14 water-elevation measuring devices along a 150-mile stretch of shoreline stretching south of Watertown, New York. The gear includes eight rapid deployment gauges, which measure water elevation using radar, and six water-pressure sensors, which are anchored below the surface and use the amount of water pressure on the device as a way to calculate water elevation. Information from these sensors will supplement data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s existing lake-elevation network. The scientists will also measure and record high water marks—the telltale lines left by seeds, weeds and leaves on buildings, bridges, trees and bluffs.
“We will use the data we’re collecting to determine the exact extent, depth and duration of the flooding,” said Robert Breault, director of the USGS New York Water Science Center. “The information will also help us better understand flooding and wave dynamics that, in turn, will help us build more resilient coastal communities.”
Working with the New York-based teams, crews from the Woods Hole, Massachusetts center will fly an unmanned quadcopter about the size of a pizza box over at least two shoreline areas: the Braddock Bay Wildlife Management Area near the town of Greece, New York; and Sodus Bay, between Rochester and Syracuse, New York. Flying at around 160 to 300 feet above ground level, the quadcopter will take hundreds of photographs of individual shoreline features. Before each quadcopter overflight, field crews will deploy black and white targets as reference points in the photographs. USGS experts will then use computer “structure from motion” software, similar to that used in some 3D gaming apps, to analyze stereo views in those photographs as a basis for detailed shoreline mapping.
“It’s seriously computer intensive work that allows us to quickly develop a 3D elevation model of the coast,” Thieler said. “With that in hand, we can model beach erosion, vegetation changes, and a variety of other flood effects.”
That information will help the New York Department of Environmental Conservation and the New York Department of State understand coastal changes taking place in the wake of this flood, and plan for any future flooding, Breault and Thieler said.
Media Alert: Reporters wishing to accompany USGS scientists in the field the week of July 10 should contact Bill Coon, 607-220-6280 or wcoon@usgs.gov by 5 pm EDT Friday, July 7.
