All farmers care about how well their land is taken care of, but one Pennsylvania farm has spent years taking extra care to protect the environment.
The Masonic Village Farm is run by the Masonic Village at Elizabethtown, a retirement community located on 1,400 acres in south-central PA. It raises dairy and beef cattle and grows corn, soybeans, hay and fruit.
Gerald Tracy, the farm's director of environmental services and land management, says Masonic Village's commitment to protecting the land dates back to the 1990s, when about 200 acres were converted from growing traditional crops to a pasture for cattle. This matters because cows that graze produce less air pollution than those that live inside year-round, and less fuel is used to raise their food. Now calves and dairy cows at Masonic Village graze about 285 days of the year.
Frank Stoltzfus, the farm's agriculture production supervisor, adds that since the late 1990s Masonic Village has gradually stopped tilling its land, a move that makes it less vulnerable to erosion. After this year he expects the farm to have stopped plowing entirely. Also, on-site solar panels provide about 10 percent of the farm's electricity needs.
These practices helped the farm receive the most recent Environmental Steward Award from the National Cattlemen's Beef Association. Masonic Village is the first farm in Pennsylvania to receive the national honor.
The farm has other plans to lessen its impact on the environment. A barn being built this year will reduce water pollution.
Sources: Frank Stoltzfus and Gerald Tracy, Masonic Village Farm
Writer: Rebecca VanderMeulen