Drying and Curing Herbs and Flowers (Hops, Hemp, and Everything Else!)

Many farms are exploring market diversification and season extension by drying or “curing” herbs and flowers. Whether the crop is culinary herbs (e.g. sage, rosemary, thyme), traditional herbal medicines, decorative flowers, hops for brewing, or CBD hemp the basic approach is the same. Drying boils down to removing water from plant matter by evaporating it …

Safely Dispensing Sanitizers

Sanitizers used for treating post-harvest agricultural water on produce farms often come in 2.5, 5, or 10 gallon totes. These totes can be cumbersome to pour from resulting in splashing and spilling. These chemicals are also shipped in concentrations that can cause injury. Here are some simple ways of increasing the safety and accuracy of …

Shedding Some Light in the Shed – Lighting for Indoor Work on the Farm

As the days shorten and we turn the clocks back, it may be a great time to think about installing or improving lights in some of our indoor spaces. Maybe you could use a bit more light to see the drill size marking in the workshop. Or, perhaps, you’d like to be able to sort …

Safe and Efficient Drying and Curing of CBD Hemp

UVM Extension Agricultural Engineering, Resource Innovation Institute, Efficiency Vermont, and VT Division of Fire Safety recently teamed up to provide a webinar as part of the UVM Extension NW Crops and Soils Team Hemp and UVM Extension New Farmer Project series. This session focused on safely and efficiently drying and curing hemp to support customer …

Considerations for Fruit and Vegetable Growers Related to Coronavirus & COVID-19

Updated 3/18/2020 The current COVID-19 pandemic is a common concern and many are wondering what they can and should do. The information here is intended to help guide the fruit and vegetable farming community. If you have concerns or additional suggestions please contact the UVM Extension Produce Safety Team (producesafety@uvm.edu / (802) 257-7967) or the …

Planning an Efficient and Safe Wash/Pack Area

By Chris Callahan, Hans Estrin, and Andy Chamberlin Reading not your thing? We have a free, 8-Part webinar video series that goes into depth on all of the following topics discussed below. Project Planning for Postharvest Efficiency, Profitability & Food Safety Summary Efficiency and food safety are integral parts of running a profitable and viable …

Ventilation in Greenhouses and High Tunnels

I had the pleasure of facilitating a workshop at the 2019 NOFA-MA Summer Conference about Ventilation in Greenhouses and High Tunnels. It provided an opportunity to collect information from various sources, ground truth observations with growers, and to revisit some fundamentals. The big takeaway, for me, is that there are many, many ways to ventilate …

Hygienic and Sanitary Design for Produce Farms

Hygienic design intentionally creates or improves spaces and equipment so they can be cleaned and sanitized as appropriate. This post, associated PDF guide and checklist (PDF and Excel, instructions) are tools we developed to help apply hygienic and sanitary design practice on produce farms. We also collaborated on a video introduction to hygienic design with …

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