Posted on 08/14/2016 1:58:28 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Maryrose Littler, who is committed to organic farming and permaculture, picks fresh onions from her grandmother Barbara Keyes’ raised vegetable beds near McArthur.
Two Class of 2016 graduates — organic farmer-in-the making Maryrose Littler, and Kayla Cline, raised on an historic farm in Albany — represent the future of farming in southeastern Ohio. Littler recently graduated from Athens High School and Cline from Alexander High School.
Littler enjoys living an organic lifestyle on her parents’ five-acre homestead near Morrison-Gordon Elementary School, where she helps raise honeybees, homegrown vegetables, chickens and beef. She is vegetarian for the most part, although her father and brother hunt. She is committed to chemical-free food, including those without GMOs (genetically modified organisms) used to grow some foods found in grocery stores.
“I try to do the permaculture thing,” Littler said. “It’s kind of like my own personal rule: If I know where (food) is coming from, I’ll eat it.”
Littler defines “permaculture” as food sources that are self-sustaining, even without humans to tend to them — like fungi planted on a log to become mushrooms, or fruit trees. Her grandmother, Barbara Keyes, lives on a large tree farm on Brooks Martin Road near McArthur, where Littler helps her grandmother grow vegetables in raised beds that include onions, rhubarb, kale, green beans, tomatoes, and eggplant. Keyes has a “zero-waste policy” that includes using all fallen trees on the tree farm for mulch. Leftover organic food is composted or, in the case of salad, fed to the birds.
“Chickens are salad eaters,” Keyes said.
Littler, who is taking a “gap year” following high school graduation, is gleaning important organic knowledge from her grandmother. She will take that knowledge with her to the west coast: Littler departed June 3 to work with the Youth Corps on trail building and rehabilitation projects near Eugene, Oregon.
When she returns in October, Littler plans to gain work experience on an organic farm — possibly through WWOOF, or World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms, where young farmers-in-the-making volunteer while learning sustainable agriculture. Eventually, she plans to study agriculture and conservation, possibly at Hocking College. Her brother, Craig, graduated from Hocking College with a degree in forestry.
Cline lives on a large sheep farm on Factory Road in Albany that is home for up to 700 crossbred sheep at any one time — 300 ewes, and 400 lambs. Her father, Curt Cline, owns the 156-acre farm registered as an Ohio Historic Family Farm officially founded in 1879. The family also owns two other farm properties in Meigs County where their sheep graze.
“I like animals and want to keep our farm in the family,” said Cline, who was a Future Farmers of America member in high school and gained experience with growing produce in the school greenhouse and selling vegetables to customers. She also raises pigs and will show them during the Athens County Fair.
Farm labor is something Cline enjoys. She earned a prestigious state Environmental Science and Natural Resources Award while a sophomore at Alexander.
The award led to her applying for and receiving a federal grant of $87,000 from the Environmental Quality Incentive Program. She used the grant for upgrading one of her family’s two 75-acre farm properties in Meigs County, on which her parents list her as the sole operator.
Operating heavy machinery herself, including a tractor and a bulldozer for creating a gravel roadway, Cline also built fencing, a new waterline, and purchased a heavy use pad for sheep. The entire project took two years and was completed before Cline started her senior year of high school.
Cline will be study accounting and financing at Hocking College this fall. Her father, Curt Cline, said she already manages personal finances very well. As the sole operator of the farm property, she learned to complete her own income taxes — as a 16-year-old.
“She has an incredible amount of experience and a foot up on other kids her age because of her farming experience,” Cline’s father said. “I think she has a bigger future than she realizes in farming as she advocates for food and consumer safety.”
With regards to organic gardening, we’ve been there and done that, for about 4 years. My picture was actually published in the Organic Gardening magazine in 1992 when I submitted a short story on composting in the winter.
We stopped because it is labor intensive. If that’s all there is to one’s life, then OK. But it’s not practical on a commercial level. Prepping raised beds, pulling weeds by hand, making organic fertilizer by composting and manure teas, etc, etc.
Now we till with motorized tillers, use herbicides, granular fertilizers. The veggies are just as good and we have time for other things.
We’ve never been organic but they are coming up with some really good organic products that we use.
Not to mention the yield
Depending on when Curt Cline attended high school he may
never have been a member of the Future Farmers of America.
The organization which I consider to be the greatest
youth organization in history changed their title to
plain FFA sometime in the 70s. It seems they were early
victims of self imposed PC. The organization had gained
chapters in urban high schools which often focused on
Ornamental Horticulture but didn’t like the farmer
“stigma” associated with “Future Farmers”. The loss
of Future Farmers was a head shaker for us old guard
rural types.
Those Ohio river valley counties from Belmont on down are extremely depressed. There is widespread rural poverty. The terrain isn’t very hospitable to farming and industry has left. What there is are coal fired power plants that Obama and Hillary are sworn to destroy. Lovely country but the people are suffering. The story is much the same across Appalachia.
Gas drilling has injected a lot of money. They sit on some very productive plays but currently that is depressed as well because of the low commodity prices.
The politics of a name change are always tricky. Another consideration was that the great majority of those employed in the ag sector are not farmers. The FFA recognized that it would paint itself into a very small corner if it did not look beyond production agriculture. As a practical matter, the bulk of farm family income is earned off the farm, and most farm kids will not themselves go on to farm. If an organization is interested in the future of young people in rural America, it will almost inevitably develop programs that cater to more than the tiny cadre that will inherit dad’s farm.
Your point is valid. The powers that adjusted the
organization name recognized the rising importance
of agri business. In my mind it all starts with farming.
However, that has to be explained and to have to
continually explain causes confusion about the organization.
Changing to FFA was probably best.
My dad who died last year started two HS ag departents.
He taught for 13 years before becoming the California
Asst State FFA advisor. When he taught there were no
girls in the organization. He could see the writing on
the wall so he encouraged the state FFA officers to
push for female inclusion in the organization. On
the national level it was California and Texas that
combined to influence the addition of girls.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.