Summer 2026 Week 9 Newsletter
Howdy Folks,
Well it seems like the smoke from the burning Borial Forest has entered everyone’s reality where we are living. Here is an amazingly descriptive link to a post by Hudson Valley Weather from Thursday 7/16/26 about the wildfire smoke that has been posted on Facebook. It answered questions I had and gave me more to think about other than smoke.
Life here is a little hectic. The smoke from Canada’s world largest Boreal Forest Burning feels a little like a blanket that is wrapping us in the thickness of our current events. I do think the ripple effect is real! I understand that life has a way of swaying with the energies that are being put forth. As we deal with the smoke, may we think of those in the fire. If our thoughts can be supportive and anything we can do for our neighbors in these ever so wild times, lets.
Yesterday, Aeros joined other farmers from our district went to participate in a round table with State Senator Glenn Thompson to talk about Agricultural issues at hand at this time. Her call to action were subsidies to be put towards small farmers, for aid in helping to fortify and build local market distribution. She actually had a list of items to address with the Senator. One of the first items to bring to attention on the list was extreme weather conditions making farming more intense and unpredictable. More were, deer pressure and crop loss; proposing open season on deer hunting in PA, and if not this than open season on farms with crop damage. This issue had all the farmers chiming in. One guy said that the deer eat 10% of his income!!! More topics were heavy erosion due to heavy rains, unreliable fast internet, increasing research and encouraging expansion of organic agriculture, thanking him for his work in putting together legislation that makes applying for workers in the H2A migrant visa worker program more simple, a request to continue to support programs that buy local food from farmers to feed families via foodbanks, a shout out that paying for health insurance through the market place doubled for our family, seed prices continue to rise, fuel prices at the highest they have been in years, why are big farms getting subsidies to keep the price of food down and yet not small farms, that are dealing with the same high prices of expenses. My favorite quote from this meeting that Senator GT said was, “Food Security = National Security”.
Today, this Tuesday Aeros is having a Zoom meeting with Senator Fetterman to talk Ag Shop. This meeting was organized by NSAC, National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition. Aeros joined this group this past February on Capital Hill to do her first in person lobbying along with other farmers from PASA, Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture and NSAC. It’s been an interesting introduction into politics, coming from agriculture and speaking on agriculture. We think it’s important to be a voice at the table, so we are getting involved and learning the ropes of 5 minutes of talk time, and trying to bring attention to issues at hand in our realm of Agriculture. I’m certainly a bottle of nerves, so I have some work to do on getting my point across more fluidly. But I’m always like this when doing something new, uncertain and nervous.
Your Farmers,
Chris, Aeros, and the Who Crew
The Purple Haze Carrots bolted in the heat, making beautiful flowers that very closely resemble our native Queen Anne's Lace, AKA Wild Carrot, an ancestor of the carrots we know and love! Sadly we will have only a little this summer, but hopefully more in the fall.
Purple Haze Carrot Flower.
Queen Anne's Lace, Wild Carrot Flower