According to this AP story appearing in media outlets such as ABC News and USA Today, the university’s Extension Center for Sustainable Agriculture is helping farmers grow shiitake mushrooms, a profitable enterprise for which demand is now outstripping supply. In a three-year UVM-Cornell study, funded by a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, researchers found that growing mushrooms outdoors can be profitable to farmers with at least 500 logs (using resources from thinning their land), bringing in gross retail sales of more than $11,000 -- requiring little in overhead costs -- with shiitakes running about $16 a pound. Read the story...