agri-Culture

Send us Fan Mail I love Canada!  That’s been the refrain in the car on this trip.  We’ve been Milling About on the Emerald Isle, our new co-opted name for Prince Edward Island, the Canadian province.  We stayed in Belfast (the PEI one, not the other one), and enjoyed a phenomenal week touring the gentle green fields of potatoes, birdwatching and shell finding, chatting in yarn shops, learning the...

Send us Fan Mail "Shire" and "guild" refer to a wide variety of subjects, ranging from Tolkien's fictional hobbit homeland to real-world administrative districts in the UK, video game factions, and even historic trades. But, today we are talking about CNCH, otherwise known as Conference of Northern California Handweavers. Don't let the name fool you.  According to the...

Send us Fan Mail We all know that water is precious, and that the soil is important, but do we really know what happens when we take both of them for granted?  We should know our history, because the Dust Bowl occurred less than a century ago.  We might start treating the Ogallala Aquifer like the source that waters 25% of the agricultural production in the entire country, instead of like a drinki...

Send us Fan Mail We just returned from Iowa, after attending the Farm to Film Fest. Our film "A Connecticut Farmer and the King's Cow", was selected as one of the films to screen over the weekend event. The thing that stood out us, while in the town of Washington, was that it's obvious at this festival and the town itself, is that they love the arts. You know we gotta say it &q...

Send us Fan Mail I just returned from my journey to Scotland and loved every minute that I spent there. From the cobbled streets of Edinburgh, to the Glen Cruitten House, and of course my workshop with Moy Mackay. I'm so excited to share my stories with you on this episode. Links: https://glencruittenhouse.com/dev/ https://www.moymackay.com/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edinburgh Support the...

Send us Fan Mail We’re back in Texas!  For Texas Wool Week, mind you, but that’s not the focus today.  Our topic could be almost anything, because Texas is a place chock full of people filled with fortitude, gracious hospitality, and a reverence for the history they’ve lived in full color.  They take pride in combinations of peoples and cultures like almost no one else does, and their trails and p...

Send us Fan Mail Susan has some exciting news to share in this episode. A new program with her students and a trip of a lifetime to the Highlands to study with renowned fiber artist Moy Mackay. Links: https://www.moymackay.com/ https://plymagazine.com/about-us/meet-the-team/ https://plymagazine.com/ https://glencruittenhouse.com/dev/ Support the show

Send us Fan Mail Leslie Amick is an artist and naturalist. A love of nature and the beauty surrounding all of us influences all of Leslie's work. She loves to explore the flora and fauna by creating likenesses using textiles. Mostly wool, the sculptures she creates not only highlight a particular beast or plant, but gives them a sense of being. Her sculptures are described as whimsical most o...

Send us Fan Mail This month Susan stopped by one of her go to places for her crafting...slowfiber in Monterey, CA. Jaki Canterbury is building a community. Sharing maker skills, supplies and time.  At slowfiber, the classroom is available, the shop is full of sustainability treasures and the ideas are boundless. Jaki says... You bring what you don't need and then get what you do need in the B...

Send us Fan Mail For today's episode, we are at the Pennsylvania Farm Show. We sat down and had a discussion about pork (since it was Pork Day at the show) with Courtney Gray, Executive Director for the PA Pork Producers Council.  Links:  https://www.whypapork.com/ https://www.sonofabutchershow.com/ Support the show

Send us Fan Mail Hello Everyone and a Happy 2026! This month Susan sits down to discuss all things pop culture and the influences it's had on her art and life and maybe yours. So, cue up your Betamax deck and reminisce about what inspired you and your crafts. Links: https://www.mosshollowhill.com https://www.starwars.com/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stranger_Things https://www.imdb.com/titl...

Send us Fan Mail It’s our last podcast of 2025 already.  In honor of what’s left in the barrel at the end of the year, the best way to enjoy both is to drink up with Paul and Pierce of Taconic Distillery.   For this one, we have a video on the Backyard Green Films YouTube channel to go with this one, in case your imagination needs a visual boost.  For the taste buds, you might want to head to the...

Send us Fan Mail On this episode Susan discusses the joy of making gifts. Whether that be a handmade felted ornament, a special song, or holiday memories. Links: https://youtu.be/fGmAekTPD5c?si=Sg45IZ3I5Ukd7HfL https://www.mosshollowhill.com/ Support the show

Send us Fan Mail And on the 8th day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, "I need a caretaker" -- so God made a Farmer.  --Paul Harvey Links: https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/PDFFiles/Paul%20Harvey%20-%20God%20Made%20A%20Farmer.pdf https://www.collierswcd.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/2013_02_Gazetteer.pdf https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Harvey Support the show

Send us Fan Mail For this month's podcast I travel to Rhinebeck, NY for the NY State Sheep & Wool Festival. I met so many wonderful and talented people...I was totally geeking out. With my cameraman Oscar in tow, the two of us interviewed some amazing talent, from rug hooking to fine art. So please sit back and enjoy this month's episode of Susan's Shire. Links: http://www.raven...

Send us Fan Mail Muck, glorious muck!  Sounds funny, but it’s true.  The “muck” found north of NYC and south of the capital city may look like black dirt to some, but it’s more like black gold to those who know – and that’s not a Clampett reference.  The agricultural region known as the Hudson Valley grows almost everything like nowhere else, due to this phenomenal resource. Join us today as we sp...

Send us Fan Mail This month Susan discusses the difference between a yarn festival, a fiber festival and everything in between. Susan just returned from the Lambtown Festival in Dixon, CA and will be heading to Rhinebeck, NY for the 45th annual New York State Sheep and Wool Festival. She gives us a little history about some of these festivals and what inspired her down the path of fiber arts and t...

Send us Fan Mail Sheep are cute and fluffy and produce that wonderful stuff from which many sweaters are born.  But there’s another side to them that doesn’t get mentioned quite so often.  Lamb is an incredibly common meat in most other countries of the world, but not so much in America. Nick Forrest is trying to change that direction, to capture the possibilities of a multipurpose animal that fit...

Send us Fan Mail Exciting news for fiber enthusiasts! We're thrilled to announce a dynamic collaboration between Susan Shirley , a creative figure in the fiber arts community, and the creators of the popular agri-Culture podcast . Together, we're embarking on a journey each month to bring you captivating stories and insightful interviews from the diverse and fascinating world of fiber. S...

Send us Fan Mail Mark Winslow is from West Falmouth, Maine, where one member or another of his family has farmed on Marston Homestead since the 1790’s.  That seems like a pretty traditional bunch, and moving around doesn’t seem to be applicable. But that’s not necessarily so.  We met up with Mark and his oxen demonstration at the American Milking Devon conference in Tunbridge, Vermont.  And these...

Send us Fan Mail We search for peace in this chaotic month, and find it in a little shop in Kingston, New York.  The Yarn Farm is made those who like the company of kindred spirits to ply their craft, sure.  It’s also great for those who might want to stop for a quick skein or an artsy crafty yarn-ish item, as well.   But for those of us who might find Zen in an adult beverage, a perfect charcuter...

Send us Fan Mail Today, we meet up with John Garcia of Dancing Sun Farm.  We were able to grab a moment of conversation with him at the lively meetup known as Texas Wool Week, held in the wild weather days of March at Sheepwalk Ranch in Bandera.  Cold, wind, sun, warmth – we had it all.  After all, this IS Texas. After 29 years in the U.S. Army, John began his second career in service, but this ti...

Send us Fan Mail Any time you put the word “summit” in something, it mentally becomes bigger than you previously thought.  A conference on steroids, in most people’s minds.  And when you do an ag-related summit in California, that notion of grandeur can be well deserved, even when you take away the size of the state itself.  The sheer amount of agricultural exports that the producers in California...

Send us Fan Mail In what started out as a May Day date (that’s a truckload of compost in Rick and Elara’s world), a visit to San Pasqual Valley Soils struck black gold (again, compost).   In one of the most fortuitous spontaneous Backyard Green Films conversations yet, an extremely knowledgeable dirt farmer by the name of Craig Kolodge, PhD (“Dr. K.” to pretty much everyone) gave an impromptu inte...

Send us Fan Mail On today's podcast we meet up with Brook Sarson from CatchingH2O.  We followed Brook as she took a passel of learners and UCSD's Director of the Bioregional Center, Keith Pezzoli, PhD, on a tour of a greywater and rain catchment project that her company had recently installed.  Water management is a favorite topic for us here at Backyard Green Films.  With efforts like t...