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This year’s Daviess County Food Production
Tour focused on alternative enterprises with stops at a blueberry farm, a
produce and corn maze farm, and a vineyard.
“As you can see today, traditional agriculture is still strong and
alternative agriculture is also strong in this community.“
Wayne Matingly,
agricultural lender and member of the chamber committee |
By Laura Skillman
OWENSBORO, Ky., (Aug. 17, 2005) – Three busloads of mostly city dwellers baked
in the late afternoon heat to learn more about agriculture’s impact on their
community.
This year’s Daviess County Food Production Tour focused on alternative
enterprises with stops at a blueberry farm, a produce and corn maze farm, and a
vineyard.
The tour is a Greater Owensboro-Daviess County Chamber of Commerce and Daviess
County Farm Bureau sponsored event. Annette Heisdorffer, county horticulture
agent, and Clint Hardy, county agriculture and natural resources agent with the
University of Kentucky Cooperative Extension Service, serve on the chamber’s
agribusiness committee and help select the locations.
“This year agritourism was the theme, and these three locations are all good
ones,” she said.
Extension agents and specialists have also worked with all three producers in
various capacities, including site selection, variety selection and integrated
pest management, Heisdorffer said.
The tour lets people not associated with farming see what today’s agriculture is
all about. Buses departed from the Extension office and returned folks there for
a meal at the tour’s conclusion.
“With the high prices of gasoline, this shows them they don’t have to go far for
entertainment and to enjoy the environment around them,” she said.
One of the tour’s stops was at Bruce Kunze’s vineyard. Kunze is growing
primarily one variety and sells his grapes to a vineyard in Nicholasville. Kunze
said he decided to grow the grapes as a post-retirement occupation and has
relied on the expertise of other growers and especially UK Extension fruit
specialists and Heisdorffer.
“It’s not like growing a garden, and if you don’t want to grow it again next
year, you don’t,” he said. “Once it’s all planted you either have to take care
of it or tear it all out, and there’s a big cost up front.”
Nancy McCormick, of Blueberries of Daviess County, said with the loss of tobacco
the family began looking for something else to add to their farming income. They
chose blueberries.
“We wanted to do something no one else was doing,” she said.
They began planting in 2001 and have about 3,000 plants. Their first year of
production was 2004. Ten different varieties are grown on the farm to enable the
season to run from early June to the end of July.
The food tour began about 12 years ago but was discontinued for a few years
before being resurrected in 2004, said Wayne Mattingly, an agricultural lender
and member of the chamber committee.
“As members of the agriculture industry we are very proud of our history,” he
said. “As you can see today, traditional agriculture is still strong and
alternative agriculture is also strong in this community.“
Writer: Laura Skillman
270-365-7541 ext. 278
Contact: Annette Heisdorffer,
270-685-8480
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