Dale Welch is an organic beef farmer in Rappahannock County. Once considering himself an opponent to all things "environmental", he decided to participate in a Best Management Practice cost-share out of wholly economic motivations.
PEC
Sharing the Experience
For over thirty years, Jimmy Henshaw has been implementing Best Management Practices (BMPs) on his 500-acre cattle farm in Greene County. He started participating in cost-share programs after growing up watching his dad take conservation measures of his own, to keep his land healthy and productive.
Dairy with a Plan
Ken Smith uses a Nutrient Management Plan and other Best Management Practices to keep his dairy and fields clean and efficient.
Water Quality and Land Use
Streams and rivers are likely to be healthy when at least 91% of the ground in their watershed remains permeable, allowing soil and plants to filter precipitation.
1,000 Acres of Jefferson County Preserved
Members of the Carter family acted together in 2009 to protect nearly 1,000 acres of land in Albemarle County that has been in their family since 1730. The Carters’ ancestors were neighbors to the Jeffersons, with a plantation about seven miles from Monticello, and the 1792 home, Redlands, suggests a Jeffersonian influence. The house was built by Martin Thacker, who also built Monticello, and its plan resembles Thomas Jefferson’s unbuilt design for the Virginia governor’s mansion.
Wolftown Farm with Historic Round Barn Protected
Joyce Gentry lives on the land where she lived as a child-a farm in Wolftown in Madison County, toward the foothills of the mountains, that has been in her family for generations. Mrs. Gentry, a retired math teacher, says, “I’ve lived on farms my whole life.” Her son and daughter-in-law Brad and Amy Gentry now raise beef cattle on the family farm-a 145 acre spread with a horizon full of mountain views.
Mrs. Gentry’s strong ties to the land motivated her to protect it with a conservation easement last year. “I’m trying to keep the countryside like it is,” she says.
New Park at Gilberts Corner
The land at Gilberts Corner in Loudoun County that PEC saved from development in 2009 is now part of a public park at a gateway to one of America’s most historic landscapes.
Saving the Farm
How conservation can help working farmers achieve their goals
David and Terry Ingram are father-son farmers who recently donated conservation easements on their farms in Brandy Station, in Culpeper County.
Brandy Station is a great place for farming, with rich soils and moderate slopes. In fact, a full two thirds of Culpeper County ranks as farmland of statewide importance.
Loudoun’s Billion Dollar Debt
What can we learn from Loudoun’s financial trouble?
Loudoun County, once the fastest growing county in the nation, is now $1 billion in debt—a direct consequence of growing too fast, too much, too scattered.
Highway Through Keswick?
Can the local community come up with a better plan for Routes 22 and 231 than VDOT’s plan to make it a highway?
The main road through Keswick in Albemarle County—Rtes. 22 and 231—runs through a landscape that Thomas Jefferson described as “the Eden of the United States”. Today, a traveler on this road can experience a landscape much like the one Jefferson and others of his generation saw—open farmland rising up to woodlands on the gentle slopes of the Southwest Mountains. What will it be like to travel on this road in 20 years or 50 years or 100 years? It’s an open question.