The joy of farming includes working from home — it’s a short commute, sometimes there’s a hot, mid-day meal (inexplicably referred to as dinner by many), and you get the chance to work with family, including many days being “bring your kids to work day.” The trouble is, farms are also work sites, and dangerous… Read more »
Category: Health & Wellness
A nap could improve your farming productivity
There are times of the year where hours of sleep are few and the days are long. As farmers and ranchers check on the livestock, plant the crop, and try to cover as many acres in a day as possible, sleep deprivation becomes a consequence of getting the job done. But not getting enough rest… Read more »
Do More Ag Foundation receives $20,000 from Bayer CropScience
Bayer has announced a $20,000 contribution to The Do More Agriculture Foundation — a not-for-profit organization launched this past winter to raise awareness and promote mental well-being among farmers in Canada. “We believe that through this partnership we can help increase awareness of mental health issues and break the stigma that currently exists in the… Read more »
This year’s Ag Safety Week focused on senior safety
Is your farm family ag safe? It’s Canadian Ag Safety Week, and the Canadian Agriculture Safety Association has once again teamed up with the Canadian Federation of Agriculture for the third year of its three-year campaign helping families farm safe. Each of the three years focused on a different generation of the family farm. This… Read more »
Next steps for the Do More Ag Foundation
While running their last venture, Farm At Hand, Kim Keller and business partner Himanshu Singh started a mental health initiative called “Here for Farmers,” a t-shirt fundraising campaign focused on supporting mental wellness in the agriculture community. Outside of the campaign, however, the calls kept coming in, asking for help finding mental health resources in… Read more »
Foundation to champion mental wellbeing in Canadian agriculture
A not-for-profit foundation focused on addressing mental health challenges in Canadian agriculture will officially be launched in Edmonton next week at FarmTech. The Do More Agriculture Foundation kicked off its online and social media presence this week. The initiative is the brainchild of its four founders: Kim Keller, Lesley Rae Kelly, Himanshu Singh and Kirk… Read more »
Bringing mental health first aid to the agricultural mainstream
I was in a conference call around access to mental health services last month, and a question came up that I’m sure a great many of us have considered: what can we do to break down stigma in our communities? Now, there are many ways we can go about breaking down stigma (worthy of a… Read more »
The opioid crisis isn’t ‘just an urban issue’
Substance dependency is often reported as — and thought of as — an urban issue. Statistics blur the issue, showing high numbers of dependency, and, sadly, death, in areas of greater population. But addiction is not isolated to people who live in cities. From alcohol to tobacco to what we’ll focus on in this post,… Read more »
Mental health advocate gets the picture
Canada’s leading advocate for mental health awareness in agriculture, University of Guelph veterinary medicine professor Andria Jones-Bitton, is in high demand at farm meetings to speak about her ground-breaking research results. Through her studies over the past three years, she’s discovered an abnormally high rate of depression and other mental illnesses among farmers (and veterinarians)…. Read more »
In light of Mental Illness Awareness Week
In 1992, the Canadian Psychiatric Association established Mental Illness Awareness Week (MIAW) to highlight the impact of mental illness to the Canadian public, and promote recovery. The Canadian Alliance on Mental Illness and Mental Health (CAMIMH) now coordinates the week in collaboration with its member organizations and other supporters. This year, MIAW runs from October… Read more »
Fit Farmer — Ep. 2: Building a home farm gym
One of the biggest challenges in our fitness routine on the farm is strength and conditioning. Cardio is pretty simple with wide open gravel roads and fields. It’s pretty simple to throw on some running shoes or hope on a bike and ride. Strength and conditioning on the other hand, often done at a gym,… Read more »
APAS young farmers looking to break mental health stigma
Mental health has been in the agriculture spotlight lately, with a push to break the stigma that often surrounds mental health. And the Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan’s Young Agricultural Producers (or YAP) committee is hoping to keep the conversation going. Danny Ottenbreit, southeast Saskatchewan farmer and co-chair of the YAP committee, was in the… Read more »
Global youth talk mental health at 4-H summit
Mental health challenges on the farm are not restricted to operators, or even their spouses…they affect their kids, too. And that’s one reason the Global 4-H Network Summit has dedicated a session to mental health and awareness when leaders from 70 countries converge in Ottawa this week. On Friday, July 14, the final day of… Read more »
Agriculture stress is real and we need to keep talking about it
The agriculture community is full of very strong-willed, independent people that excel at what they do. We also take pride in helping each other out. But the fact remains that farmers and ranchers fall short on identifying and discussing the need for help when it comes to mental health. One of our industry’s greatest strengths… Read more »
The Confidence of Curiosity — It’s OK to Not Know
As the weeks pass by do you keep your head down without paying much attention to the environment around you? We are all busy in our hectic lives as we try to find time for work, family, and personal time. We become so task oriented as we try to complete seeding, finish that last email,… Read more »