On Thursday, August 24th, the Farm Service Agency (FSA) announced that they will be restructuring or canceling up to 334 Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program (CREP) contracts with working landowners across the state beginning October 1, 2023. Whatcom Family Farmers, together with a coalition of farmers and environmental advocates, are ...
New report from former Asst. Solicitor to US Dept. of Interior says process not only would solve Nooksack water rights issues, but also support needed conservation and infrastructure projects impossible under litigation (LYNDEN, Wash.) Salmon habitat restoration, water supply infrastructure, flood prevention and other crucial work needed in the Nooksack ...
We’re fortunate that spring rains and snowpack this year have kept streams from dropping to the record low levels we saw during last year’s drought. But the reality is that stream flows still aren’t where they could be if our community came together to get desperately-needed infrastructure ...
News of a newly-completed salmon habitat restoration project in the midst of farmland near Lynden is underscoring farmers’ commitment to the long-term collaborative restoration work needed to help critically-endangered salmon populations in the Nooksack River Basin. Farmers in Whatcom County have been saying they want to bring together the local ...
Farmers urge all parties to come to the table and begin collaborative work to safeguard both endangered salmon and local farming, as drought underscores risks of inaction As drought conditions worsen and stream flows plummet in the wake of an historic heatwave, Whatcom County farmers are calling for all parties ...
Paul Sangha and his family have been farming in Whatcom County for about 30 years. “I'm a first-generation Punjabi Sikh berry farmer in Whatcom County,” Sangha said. He is a blueberry farmer. “My biggest fear with what we are headed into right now is not just for my ...
Rich Appel farms just north of the Nooksack River in Ferndale. “Our family has been on that farm for about 55 years and my whole life,” Appel said. “I've been living on the river and been been around the river and over the last number of years we've ...
Christine Woodward is the chair for the Portage Bay Shellfish Protection District. “I think one of the first and foremost things about the partnership between farms and salmon is respect,” she said. Farmers play a very important role in Whatcom County, she added. They provide our food source, ...
“The availability of water is vital to the future of agriculture in Whatcom County,” Lynne Rainey Wheeler said. She is a dairy farmer in Whatcom County. Her family’s farm, Coldstream Farms, is in the South Fork Valley. They have been farming there since 1978. In that time they ...
Farmers have been accused of not doing their part when it comes to preserving the environment on and around their farm. That couldn’t be further from the truth. Farmers in Whatcom County have taken many measures in recent years to not only improve their sustainability but also work toward the ...
