Bryce Hediger's Page

Oooo I know of all the requirements of Organic Certification... In fact there are land owners in my area that have taken their land out of conventional row farming years ago... saying that no one can can farm the land unless they do it organiclly.... I am going to take a neighbor up on this, she has over 60 acres that has been fallow for six years that once inspected, can produce a crop that can have the organic price premium... i believe in my intermeidate area... some day there will be the demand for organic feed and one day my goal is to grow and process my own organic grain to sell but for the time being I wan to market, the organic grain in the feed mills in PA.  

I def. know about the extra labor involve also, but I am a small farmer and if I have any hopes of having a liveable income off of farming someday; I can't compete with the conventional farmers that are becoming larger and larger, and have too tight of a grip on the land in my area.... thats why i think i need to inter this niche market, with a premium price, and land waiting to be farmed... I wish I could of started a year ago.

http://www.attra.org/attra-pub/PDF/arsenic_poultry_litter.pdf here the link discussing information I am talking about.  Again, it seems to say that chicken litter is allowed, however arcsenic is restricted substance.  So you market 10,000 acres of organic millet and you can't get enough lol... so for you the organic market is really strong?  Also the millet you market is for human consumption?

I am looking into growing organic grain for animal feedstocks... I live on Virginia's Eastern Shore, which is like part of Delaware, and Maryland's Eastern Shore.  There is a strong demand for organic grain in Delware and Pennsylaniva from what I understand... So I am talking with a organic feed mill in PA. My state Va, does not have a certifiying agency associated with the Virginia Department of Agriculture, so I am thinking of dealing with a Certifier in PA.  Its kind of crazy how there is such demand for organic products in this area but very few organic farms.  I do not know of an organic grain farm in my area.  Though given the prices I see no problem trucking everything a hundred fifty miles. 

ooo ok yeah i add u on facebook.... so colorado has little rain fall..ok... Still your operation is quite large isnt it?  10000 acres?  Is that includeing fallow arces too at any given time?  Chicken litter I am very familar with; there are alot of poultry farms around here.... however not organic poultry.... the Broiler houses have anitboitics given to them, and there for arscenic is contaminated in their manure.... however the breeder houses are not given anitboitics though there are fewer of them... I think it is kind of confusing as far as the contaminated Broiler litter, I have read that if the arscenic is small enough some certifier agencies will allow it being applied a certain way on the land... Are you familar with this?  I can give you a link that discuss more of what i mean if your confused.

You have facebook? would be interested in talking more with you.

OOO ok yeah that is an interesting crop rotation, I am not familiar with millet.... So the legume clover is one source for your nitrogen... You have any other sources? I have had a class this semester where we have to put on a seminar for the Ag faculty and the topic this year is Organic Production.... So i have been studying alot about it.  I was interested in farming organic grain before I had the class but never really thought about farming organic grain because i thought it was impractical for my area, but the more i learn and study about it the more practical and profitable it seems. 

Your rotation is interesting because it only has a two crop rotation, I have found that organic system plans have had more success the more complex and longer the rotation is.  Do you agree?  Why do you only concentrate on two crops?  Is it the growing climate of colorado?  I do not know much about Colorado either....

Interesting, so pretty much just two crops? Now when you go fallow... do you plant a cover crop to keep the weeds down?