u s department of agriculture

The Maryland Cut Flower Growers Association launched the website to consolidate cut flower information for consumers.

The program teaches participants how to farm sustainably for the environment and for their communities. The organization provides a 10 week classroom series and hands-on training at one of 13 training farms.

When you hear the term "Buy Local" you tend to think about supporting local agriculture by going to a farmer's market, a roadside fruit and veggie stand, or signing up to be part of a community-supported farm. But there's more to supporting Maryland agriculture than just food — namely, flowers and plants.

One of the most difficult parts of eating healthy is portion control.

The Baltimore County Council on Monday will vote on whether to approve $485,000 for a pilot program that would extend the free meal program to all students, regardless of income, at Hawthorne Elementary, Riverview Elementary, Dundalk Middle and Dundalk High schools.

Maryland is expanding a work-training program tied to food stamps after the state returned hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal money that could have been used to help low-income residents find jobs.

After a successful pilot at the Avenue Market in the fall, community leaders are launching a permanent weekly produce stand at the West Baltimore public market.

A bill that will limit the use of pesticides that are believed to harm bees is moving forward in the General Assembly.

The U.S. Agriculture Department says the number of farms in Maryland continues to shrink.

CSA members pay an upfront subscription fee to farmers in return for a share of the season's harvest, which is usually provided weekly.

Facing a genuine crisis-Baltimore's homeless population is approximately 30,000 a year-the city has constructed a patchwork of more than 60 homeless service providers that it oversees, creating a privately-contracted homeless services ecosystem that is chaotic, ill-managed, poorly monitored, and badly integrated with state and federal agencies.

With alternatives available and in use, legislations prohibits medical schools from using animals

The United States Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture will award $18.9 million in competitive grants to support fellowships and other higher education training projects in food, nutrition, natural resources and agriculture fields this year.

Attendees can choose from 30 sessions with more than 80 speakers and a host of agriculture related exhibits

John Sackett's Blessed Hill Honey has won prizes, but the retired Christian missionary and Timonium resident is being stung by the fact that Maryland's honeybees are dying in dramatic numbers. Del. Steve Lafferty has introduced a bill to restrict neonicotinoids, a type of insecticide that some bee advocates believe is contributing to Maryland's bee deaths.

During a Jan. 7 conference call, Maryland Department of Agriculture Secretary Joe Bartenfelder warned that "bird flu" could arrive in Maryland this spring.

Wegmans recalls more than 1,100 pounds of uninspected chicken products that were sold in stores, including its seven Maryland supermarkets.

The rule applies to operations seeking more than one farm manager, and requires measurable, documented hours and key management activities each year. Some operations of certain sizes and complexity may be allowed up to three qualifying managers under limited conditions.

The collected information will be compiled, analyzed and then published in a series of USDA reports.

On Tuesday, culinary arts teacher Curtis Bullock led his students at Hammond High School in butchering two whole hogs in preparation for his classes' post-Thanksgiving feast.

U.S. Customs agents discovered a beetle inside a shipping container in the port of Baltimore that could have posed a significant agricultural threat, the Department of Homeland Security announced Monday.

While there are no readily available statistics to share, both the USDA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are warning this week that undercooked meals or poorly kept leftovers could turn a enjoyable meal into a multi-day bout of food poisoning.

Thanksgiving is not only about giving thanks but helping those who may go hungry

Thanksgiving may be a traditional feast, but that doesn't necessarily mean you have to eat like a beast and totally disrupt your diet plan, according to nutrition experts. Some simple substitutions, strategies and recipes and allow for ample holiday repasts with necessarily adding ample pounds to your frame.

TPP levels the playing field for farmers, ranchers and manufacturers — many of them in rural areas — by eliminating more than 18,000 unfair taxes that various TPP countries put on American products and further expands our exports to the region. A top poultry exporting state like Maryland would benefit significantly from the new market access created by the elimination of taxes on exports of poultry and poultry products under TPP.

Farmers, like the Kerneys, raise turkeys in preparation for the holidays

Applicants must be Maryland residents and have experience in the field they seek to represent.

The World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer said Monday that processed meat such as bacon, hot dogs and baloney can cause colon and other kinds of cancer, and steaks and other red meat likely can too.

Eating might be escapist, but that doesn't mean the meal itself is disconnected from the rest of the world. There's more to a meal than how it tastes—food is inextricably tied to politics and history and environmental issues and culture, and I'm hoping to use this column to talk about those ties.

Farmers on Maryland's Eastern Shore and in Delaware say most crops survived last week's heavy rainfall.

The voluntary program provides financial assistance to participating farmers when the margin – the difference between the price of milk and feed costs – falls below the coverage level selected by the farmer.

Greg Havens has put in 32 years of federal service — three years on active duty in the Army and the rest as a flight test engineer. But the St. Mary's County man is not quite ready for full retirement.

Commercial use of drones has to be approved on a case-by-case basis, with just 1,000 companies nationwide getting the go ahead from the FAA. But hobbyists with $1,000 craft ready to go out of the box can fly as long as they follow some basic rules. The problem, aviation officials and researchers say, is they often don't know what those rules are.

The Ag Discovery program brings in some of the nation's brightest high school students to explore a wide variety of careers while earning three college-level credits at the University of Maryland.

Dr. Michael Gilsdorf honored by Kansas State University College of Veterinary Medicine

Bird flu threatens chickens and eggs

Leaders of the multi-state Chesapeake Bay restoration effort acknowledged Thursday that the pollution cleanup pace is lagging and vowed to catch up, though they offered no specifics.

With one in four Baltimoreans living in a food desert, city officials have a long road ahead to deliver on promises of healthy, affordable and accessible food options. One of the city's approaches follows a tried-and-true roadmap that involves offering incentives, like tax breaks for locating in underserved areas, to retailers and developers — also known as "fresh food financing." There is a simpler, less costly solution under consideration, however: changing when food stamps are

Projects underway at U.S. Department of Agriculture facilities in Maryland and elsewhere, highlighted in a report released last month, represent a push by the agency to find commercial uses for its inventions.

When kids spend their summer days at the Stanton Community Center in Annapolis, they know their stomachs won't be growling when they're swimming, boating and going on field trips.

Thursday column on ramifications of Hogan Red Line decision, Rutherford's suggestion of rapid-bus system for Baltimore

Barber Foods recalled over 1.7 million pounds of frozen, raw stuffed chicken products on Monday that may be contaminated with salmonella, according to a U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service news release.

Families in Carroll County who qualify for the federal Free and Reduced Meal program, which provides children free or reduced price meals throughout the school year, will be able to receive similar support this summer.

Agriculture officials and poultry farmers in Maryland are taking extra precautions against bird flu after outbreaks have devastated flocks in other states.

Enrollment for the 2014 and 2015 Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) and Price Loss Coverage (PLC) programs is open until Sept. 30

Since December, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has confirmed cases of avian flu in 21 states - in Iowa alone, the nation's leading egg producer, more than 31.5 million birds have been affected. The disease is highly contagious among birds and spreads through the animals' saliva, feces and nasal secretions.

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