Adaptation Practices
Adult Cow Housing
A comprehensive resource on infrastructure considerations when building new or remodeling an existing cow housing facility.
Adaptation Practices
A comprehensive resource on infrastructure considerations when building new or remodeling an existing cow housing facility.
Planning, Adaptation Practices
Making a profit growing tree fruit in the Northeast has never been easy, but could become more difficult in the coming decades as climate change progresses in the Northeast. This document is a checklist of possible climate and weather‐related challenges, and some opportunities that may increase over the next 30 years, with actions tree fruit growers can take to reduce risk or maximize opportunity.
Planning
A comprehensive guide to business planning for farmers, pulling from all available resources, including farmers and other business experts, that could be used to create a business planning primer—a guide that will help today’s alternative agriculture entrepreneurs work through the planning process and to begin developing their business plans.
Planning
This 2015 report provides an overview of regional agriculture and forest system sensitivities to climate change and adaptation strategies, a greenhouse gas emissions and mitigation profile for the region, and a summary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) programs that are vulnerable to a changing climate and what is being done to build resilience on working lands through these programs.
Adaptation Practices
A comprehensive resource on infrastructure considerations when building new or remodeling replacement/heifer housing.
Planning, Climate Impacts
State-specific summaries and key messages on the effects of climate change.
Planning, Climate Impacts
An in-depth view from 2021 at the effects climate change will have on Vermont, the state of Vermont's food system, and key actions Vermont farmers can take to adapt.
Planning
The Vermont Climate Assessment (VCA) of 2014 paints a vivid picture of a changing climate in Vermont and calls for immediate strategic planning to sustain the social, economic and environmental fabric of our state. The VCA is the first state-scale climate assessment in the country and speaks directly to the impacts of climate change as they pertain to our rural towns, cities and communities, including impacts on Vermont tourism and recreation, agriculture, natural resources and energy.
Planning
A DIY whole farm planning process designed especially for small- and mid-scale diversified operations that will help you reduce the risks and capture new opportunities created by more variable weather and extremes.
Planning, Adaptation Practices
The New England Adaptation Survey draws upon the experience of 193 fruit and vegetable growers surveyed in 2017 and 2018. It explores emerging adaptive management strategies, perceived climate related risks, and adaptive capacity.
Adaptation Practices
The Alternative Continuous-Cover Forage system (ACCF)—produces high-quality dairy cattle forage with yields comparable to traditional cropping systems, and is based on soil health management, as opposed to the traditional crop rotation of corn silage for three or more years without the use of cover crops This fact sheet outlines the basic rotations and potential crop choices of the ACCF, describes how to implement the system, and provides a summary of its environmental and economic benefits
Planning
The USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map is the standard by which gardeners and growers can determine which perennial plants are most likely to thrive at a location. The map is based on the average annual extreme minimum winter temperature, displayed as 10-degree F zones and 5-degree F half zones.
Funding
USDA Service Centers are designed to be a single location where customers can access the services provided by the Farm Service Agency, Natural Resources Conservation Service, and the Rural Development agencies. This web site will provide the address of a USDA Service Center and other Agency offices serving your area along with information on how to contact them.
Adaptation Practices, Planning
NTT is a web-based, site-specific application that estimates nutrient and sediment losses for crop and pasture at the field and/or watershed scales. Agricultural producers and land managers can define a number of management scenarios for any given field or area of interest (AOI). NTT will estimate nutrient (nitrogen and phosphorus) losses, sediment losses, and crop yields differences between the scenarios and present results in customizable reports
Adaptation Practices
A summary of agricultural IPM methods, with a list of additional resources for tracking and managing pests and learning more about IPM for farms.
Planning, Adaptation Practices
Tools to explore cover crops in the Northeast, select species, calculate nitrogen credits, and more. Cover crop selector tool gives recommendations based on your specific site and soil conditions. Website also includes further cover crop resources.
Adaptation Practices
Powerpoints and proceedings from all presentations at the 2024 New England Vegetable and Fruit Conference in Manchester, New Hampshire.
Planning, Adaptation Practices
Weather and science driven integrated pest management. A site that links data from weather stations across the Northeast. Includes forecasts by crop or by pest. Especially useful for orchards, but there are vegetable pest models as well.
Adaptation Practices
A short visual guide to manure management and other livestock production environmental issues, including nutrient management and application, managing public perception, best management practices in production areas, and infrastructure and facility practices.
Adaptation Practices, Planning
The economic tools, visualizations, and resources on this website were designed with and for small, medium, and beginning farmers and ranchers in New England to help address their unique challenges in adapting to a changing climate. These resources are available for three agricultural practices - silvopasture, irrigation, and tarping - that were identified as areas of particular interest and need among New England farmers.
Adaptation Practices, Climate Impacts
This hour-long free webinar is about the impacts of climate change on maple syrup production and how maple producers can best adapt.
Adaptation Practices
An hour-long webinar about the various invasive species growers might come into contact with in the face of climate change as well as how to deal with them in the most efficient manner.
Planning
The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and the US Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) have funded a study at UMass to evaluate the impacts of climate change on the biological resources in river and to investigate how the negative impacts of reservoir regulation could be ameliorated in the face of climate change. It is fortuitous that this study provides an excellent basis for future “watershed” type studies that may be performed by the NE CASC. The study has resulted in a full calibrated hydrology model of the Connecticut River Basin, a set of 112 different future hydrology scenarios associated with climate change, and a simulation and optimization model of the major reservoirs in the basin.
Planning
A detailed summary of climate change's impacts in the Northeast, drivers of adaptation, disproportionate impacts on certain groups, action plans, and implementation and financing of those plans.