Farm & Ranch
[AgriLife Today] North Texas Farm-to-Table program brings local producers, buyers together
By: Paul Schattenberg
By: Paul Schattenberg, 210-859-5752, [email protected]
Contacts: Dr. Greg Church, 972-548-4232, [email protected]
Dr. Rick Maxwell, 903-737-2443, [email protected]
McKINNEY – The North Texas Farm-to-Table program provides opportunities for local agricultural producers to meet with area restaurateurs, chefs and others, understand their needs and provide them with fresh, high-quality locally grown agricultural items, program coordinators said.
The North Texas Farm-to-Table events bring local producers together with restaurateurs, chefs and other buyers. (Texas A&M AgriLife Extension service photo)
“North Texas Farm-to-Table was designed to bring together local ag producers and local buyers,” said Dr. Greg Church, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service agent for horticulture, Collin County. “Our events allow producers and buyers to meet in a relaxed environment where the producers can learn about buyers’ needs. It also helps producers expand the marketability of their products and encourages them to be more successful.”
Church and other AgriLife Extension personnel are in their second full year of promoting the program. To date, they have presented five Farm-to-Table symposiums in North Texas.
“We held three Farm-to-Table programs in 2015 and from 70-100 people attended each of them,” said Dr. Rick Maxwell, AgriLife Extension agent for agricultural and natural resources, Lamar County. “Some of the agricultural products discussed at these programs include various types of garden vegetables, herbs, grass-fed beef, chickens and eggs.”
Maxwell said one area producer was interested in providing ducks for local restaurants.
That producer, Mark Page, owner of Circle 15 Farms, a 5-acre farm near Gunter, said he and local restaurateur Rick Wells, owner of Rick’s Chophouse and Harvest Seasonal Kitchen restaurants in downtown McKinney, met at a Farm-to-Table event.
“That’s when we started to wonder if we couldn’t raise ducks,” Page said. “We had already been raising chickens for eggs, but thought we should try a batch of ducks,” Page said. “That first batch worked out, so we raised and sold several more. Now we sell duck meat to four different restaurants in the area.”
Page said he has now expanded into raising guinea fowl for sale to local restaurants.
“Currently, we have about 100 ducks for producing duck meat and 31 ducks for duck eggs, as well as 275 chickens from which we get a daily egg supply,” he said. “We also have about 24 guinea fowl and are thinking about adding geese to have ready for sale to restaurants this winter.”
Page said without the program and the opportunity to meet Wells, he would not have known about the need and marketability for the types of poultry he now produces.
Wells has been a driving force behind North Texas Farm-to-Table efforts, Church noted.
“Rick actually initiated the original meeting where we talked about putting local producers and potential buyers together,” Church said. “He was very excited about the prospect of having a venue where they could meet and discuss how they might benefit one another.”
Wells, who closed a successful Italian restaurant in downtown McKinney in order to open Harvest as a showcase for locally grown foods, said for him, giving back to the community is more than a business practice, it is a philosophy.
“This is more than a matter of local producers providing local businesses with agricultural products,” he said. “I feel if you do business in a community, you are responsible for doing all you can to support that community.”
He added that he also wanted to “test the waters” to see if his community would support a restaurant focused on locally grown foods. He noted that locally grown foods were fresher and “created less of a carbon footprint” than those needing to be harvested and shipped from out of state.
“Supporting local farms and ranches also creates a ripple effect that has an impact on the entire community,” he said.
Wells, who also owns a farming operation, Waterboy Farms, said he supports more than 75 agricultural operations in the area and tries to ensure all or most of his menu items consist of ingredients acquired from no farther than 50 miles away.
Harvest Seasonal Restaurant in downtown McKinney purchases a variety of agricultural items — from grass-fed beef to vegetables and honey — from more than 75 area farms and ranches. (Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service photo)
Throughout the restaurant, from the doors and tables to the photos on the walls, display shelves and food and drink menus, there are examples of the work of local craftsmen, artisans and agricultural producers. Some of the local agricultural items used by the restaurant include duck, available seasonally, grass-fed beef, goat’s milk and cheese, artisanal meats and cheeses, chicken, eggs, pecans, various garden vegetables, fruits and honey.
“We’re always experimenting with new dishes and drinks that incorporate ingredients we can obtain locally,” Wells explained. “We’re even thinking about growing our own hops at Waterboy so we can use them to make our own beer using local ingredients.”
The success of Wells’ approach was further validated when Harvest was named one of the best new restaurants of 2014 and 2015 by D Magazine, which also singled out executive chef Andrea Shackelford as “the young chef driving a farm-to-table menu on which almost all of the meat and three-quarters of the produce are local, and the list of beer, wine and whiskey leans Texas.”
Shackelford, who said she has an appreciation for agricultural producers, has also gone through AgriLife Extension’s Master Gardener program in Collin County to learn even more about horticulture, especially the ins and outs of vegetable and fruit production. Additionally, beverage manager Brent Tyler is taking classes in conjunction with AgriLife Extension so he can become a Master Naturalist.
Wells said he owes a great deal to the AgriLife Extension office in Collin County, not only for Farm-to-Table efforts but also for providing expertise to help him determine what crops to plant at Waterboy Farms, helping with his irrigation and for other assistance.
“The local AgriLife Extension office has been incredible,” he said. “If it wasn’t for them partnering with me, I’d be a year behind where I am now.”
Maxwell said AgriLife Extension will also continue to support the program by providing information and assistance to area producers.
“We can help those wanting to provide agricultural products for local consumption by doing what we do best – educating them on how they can produce the best possible product,” he said. “That includes providing programs, instruction and technical assistance to help them to be more successful in their agricultural operations.”
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Find more stories, photos, videos and audio at http://today.agrilife.org
By Rayford Pullen | [email protected]
When May arrives, we start thinking about weed control. With two years of drought under our belts, grass grazed short and hay stocks depleted, what we do now will influence our forage conditions for the entire year. With 75 percent of our annual warm season forages made by July 15 in North Texas, we need to get the grass growing while the sun shines.
Speaking of the sun shining, the biggest deterrent to growing lots of grass is restricted sunlight, and the biggest sun blockers we have are weeds.
Have you noticed weeds are normally just slightly taller than your grass and are probably blocking 90 percent of the sunlight from reaching the grass itself? So obviously, we need to improve conditions, so sunlight reaches the plants we want to grow.
With grass extremely short, more sunlight is hitting the soil surface now, which in turn results in more weed seed germinating. With the moisture we have received, we expect an abundance of weeds this year.
To read more, pick up a copy of the May issue of NTFR magazine. To subscribe by mail, call 940-872-5922.
By Jared Groce
Rural land sales are continuing on a steady pace for early spring, with prices holding very strong with the sell-to-list price ratios remaining very high, even on properties that have been on the market for a longer than usual time period. The total number of transactions are picking up once again as the spring selling season kicks off, and the average acreage continues to decrease.
Larger acreage properties seem to be in higher demand than smaller properties currently, with many buyers simply parking cash in real estate to hedge against inflation. Interest rates seem to have settled down and most experts agree that rates will be reduced by the fed this year. Some lenders have programs in place that allow the buyer to reduce their rates without having to go through a full refinance ordeal.
To read more, pick up a copy of the May issue of NTFR magazine. To subscribe by mail, call 940-872-5922.
Future Farmers of America was founded by a group of farmers in 1928 with the mission of preparing the next generation of agriculture. It has done just that during its 95-year history, as the organization works to give back to others by following its motto, “learning to do, doing to learn, earning to live, living to serve.”
FFA is an organization made up of state associations, and at the helm of the Texas FFA is a team of 12 officers representing their respective areas within the Lone Star State. These individuals dedicate a year of their lives as they serve members, provide leadership, and work together with the state staff and board of directors to develop policy and lead the organization of over 177,000 members.
North Texas is represented by Area IV and Area IV, stretching from Wilbarger County to Bell County and from Runnels County to Grayson County. This year, those chosen to lead this great area are State President Isaac Hawkins Jr., Area IV, and State Vice President Weston Parr, Area V.
Parr is from the Sam Rayburn FFA chapter and the Area V Association, but the leader who now serves more than 19,100 members of Area V entered the FFA organization as a shy teenager who sat in the back of the room.
“I didn’t talk to a whole lot of people. I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life or where I could see myself, so I wasn’t involved on my high school campus,” Parr recalled.
“Then I started FFA and slowly but surely, my ag teachers worked me into attending more contests, meeting new people, and speaking. I remember the first time I gave an officer speech to my chapter. I can still remember how embarrassing it was. To see the progression from that moment to speaking on stage at the state convention in front of thousands of people. Now I feel like I can enter the industry I want and be successful all because of what FFA afforded me for five years.”
There is not much Parr did not do during his time in high school. His contest participation included chapter conducting, wool judging, cotton judging, wildlife, and job interview, but his favorite was extemporaneous speaking, which he did not start until his senior year of high school.
“I wish I could go back to my freshman, sophomore, and junior years and start that sooner. I think if I had more time, I would have been more successful than I already was, but that was something I didn’t realize I liked at the time. I’m not naturally somebody who likes to speak in public, but it was actually my favorite,” Parr said.
Parr won several awards during his time competing. In 2023 alone, Parr earned the Texas FFA Service-Learning Proficiency title, was a National FFA Service-Learning Proficiency finalist, and a Texas FFA Extemporaneous Speaking finalist. In addition to his CDE and LDE events during high school, he showed commercial steers at Houston, and boilers at most major shows, participated in the county show with projects in ag mechanics, showed goats from time to time, and showed heifers until graduation.
“FFA provides invaluable resources and knowledge to be successful once you leave high school and you are out of the blue jacket for the first time. I have been a part of a lot of great organizations over the years, and they are all great in their own way, but in my opinion, FFA is the most successful at producing members of society who want to go and do something with themselves,” Parr said.
He was halfway through his time as Area V Association President and attending the national convention when he began to ponder the idea of running for state office.
“This is around the time when you usually figure out if you want to go through and be a state officer or you decide that area officer is your last run. I was unsure of where I wanted to go, but I knew I didn’t want to be done with FFA. I decided maybe it would be a good opportunity not only for me to make more friendships and connections, but also to give back to the program that allowed me to be able to do what I can do today,” Parr explained.
To read more, pick up a copy of the May issue of NTFR magazine. To subscribe by mail, call 940-872-5922.
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