Page 6 - Plain Sect News Today

Pennsylvania farms have increased their sales over the past three years even as the state’s broader ag and food sector has declined slightly. Food and farming have a $133 billion economic impact in Pennsylvania and support, directly or indirectly, nearly 600,000 jobs, according to a report released last month. “It points to 18% of our gross state product (that) is generated by agriculture,” Ag Secretary Russell Redding said in a presentation April 28 at Bell & Evans’ hatcher...

The proposal, published in September, aims to reduce the time it takes to trace contamination issues from consumer to source. Public comments on the rule are due by Feb. 22. But in order to make a comment, the public needs to understand what is being proposed. Emily Griep, the food safety manager at the United Fresh Produce Association, discussed the proposed rule Feb. 8 during the virtual Mid-Atlantic Fruit and Vegetable Convention. Currently, investigations of contaminated foods take a lot of...

Before I even knew what happened I was down on the slatted concrete floor with a huge cow standing over top of me, her head repeatedly coming down and grinding my body into the unforgiving hardness below. Shoved against a metal railing, I was able to pull myself up while trying to fend off this beast but she reared back, her head down and bashed into me again, sending my walkie-talkie flying across the barn and knocking me to the floor once more. Defenseless and unable to get away, I began yell...

Some paint, handcrafted furniture and a few antiques gave it that “homestead” feeling over time. Now, the results of that primitive decorated farmhouse were featured in the December 2020 edition of Country Sampler magazine. When Rick and Holly Weirick first moved with their daughter, Paisley, to the farmhouse years ago, they knew there was some work ahead of them within the walls of the house, which was built in 1910. Weeds had taken over much of the 5-acre property. Repairs needed to...

If you decorate your home with holiday lights, you know the work is best described as a labor of love. That’s how the third-generation Messick brothers describe their work for the family’s Messick’s Farm Equipment animated tractor choir program each year. Lucas, Neil and Kevin Messick use upwards of 40,000 lights (some 10,000 replaced every season) attached to excavators, tractors and mowers that are synchronized to holiday music. Christmas Spirit Photo by Art Petrosemolo The giv...