In the pursuit of healthy living, we’re working against some pretty incredible obstacles, like 6 million years of evolutionary biology and 15 thousand years of human civilization. At least, that’s how founding director of Yale University’s Yale-Griffin Prevention Research Center and president of the American College of Livestyle Medicine, David Katz explains it. “We live… Read More
Author: Debra Murphy
Debra Murphy is a Field Editor based out of central Alberta, where she never misses a moment to capture with her camera the real beauty of agriculture.
For the majority of us on the sidelines of the Fort McMurray fire, it is impossible to understand what evacuees are going through. Many have no idea what — if anything — remains of the homes they were asked to leave immediately on Tuesday, when the entire city was put under a mandatory evacuation order. It’s one thing… Read More
Registration for CanolaPALOOZA in Lacombe, Alberta is now live, and I can’t help but be a little excited. Last year, event organizers hinted at great content and wacky entertainment, but I really didn’t know what to expect. I showed up with camera in hand, sunscreen on face. Photos from CanolaPALOOZA ’15 | Registration for ’16… Read More
I had hoped to get this interview out on Friday, as a celebration (as you’ll hear) of Earth Day and National Soil Conservation Week in our country. As unfortunate circumstances would have it, work piled up, and eventually the weekend (whatever that is) knocked on the office door. My original intent behind interviewing Jill Clapperton,… Read More
Walking through the Western Canadian Dairy Seminar tradeshow for the first time felt a bit reminiscent of my first day on the job. I was equally overwhelmed and intrigued by all the new faces and unrecognizable products. But, when I spotted Cargill’s booth (a no doubt familiar logo) in conjunction with a CowSignals display, I had to stop… Read More
Last month, I stopped in for the annual Organic Alberta Conference in Olds to hear what’s new in the world of organics. I was a little later than I intended, but happened to sneak into the first concurrent session of the day just in time to hear Blake Hall of Prairie Gold Meats addressing an intrigued… Read More
Despite minimum size requirements and increasing license fees, it seems trophy hunting of bighorn sheep may have some rather alarming, and unintended consequences. David Coltman, a professor of biological sciences at the University of Alberta, alongside his colleagues from the University of Sherbrooke, has been studying data collected on bighorn sheep on Ram Mountain, near Nordegg, Alberta. The… Read More
In December, immediately after attending the Farm Forum Event in Saskatoon, I hit the air again, this time bound for Boise, Idaho. I was en route to Ranching for Profit, a course I signed up to attend with a few of my close family members. The only cautionary tales I had heard were from people… Read More
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) recently released its report on the 19th case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), concluding the likely cause was contamination of feed on-farm. “The carry-over of a small amount of residual contaminated feed associated with an earlier case (17) on the same birth farm is the most plausible explanation for… Read More
I hit the road this week to attend a Planned Grazing Management workshop in Lacombe, organized by the Grey Wooded Forage Association and Organic Alberta. It was the first time I’ve heard Jim Gerrish (co-owner of American Grazinglands Services LLC) speak, though I’ve often heard his name mentioned in circles of self-proclaimed “graziers.” In addition to Gerrish, who… Read More
Editor’s Note: This blog was written the day after the election. We waited for approval from the area’s Returning Officer. Not because we had to, but because we wanted to ensure no oaths were broken in the typing of this blog (Debra’s a stickler for rules). A couple of weeks ago, I was forwarded a… Read More
Every year the Canadian Farm Writers Federation (CFWF) hosts a conference and awards night, complete with agriculture and agri-food related tours. This year, for the first time, I was along for the ride. I have to say, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I’ve met a great number of farm writers, journalists and reporters since the… Read More
Author’s Note: Okay, there are probably plenty of reasons you should bale instead of pellet (like: we don’t really have a choice yet). It’s just, well, it’s not every day that I get to use a noun as a verb in a headline. Last week I stumbled upon one of the coolest tweets I’ve seen all… Read More
There’s no doubt that having a vaccination protocol on hand could save booster misses, bring all farm employees to the same page and improve overall confidence in our herd health programs. But, developing that protocol can be more than a little overwhelming. At the 2015 UCVM Beef Cattle Conference, I (finally!) tracked down Cody Creelman, veterinarian… Read More
Note: There are a couple of rather graphic pictures in this post. Audio included at the end. Losing an animal to any sort of predation can be incredibly difficult to stomach, and a lot of times completely unexpected. The scenes we typically imagine in the wild are those of peace, where cattle low, birds sing,… Read More