JOANNE CLENDINING: From the Mason-Dixon line to the mighty Potomac and all points in between, there's a wagon load of agricultural goodness to be had.

Did you know a vineyard is both a science and an art?

That farms can be a training ground?

And honeybees can thrive in an urban setting?

Don't go anywhere stories about the people who work our land and feed our state are coming up next on "Maryland Farm and Harvest."

NARRATOR: Major funding for "Maryland Farm and Harvest" is made possible in part by the Maryland Grain Producers Utilization Board, investing in smarter farming to support safe and affordable food, feed and fuel, and a healthy Bay.

Additional funding provided by Maryland's Best.

Good for you, good for Maryland MARBIDCO, helping to sustain food and fiber enterprise for future generations.

A grant from the Maryland Department of Agriculture Specialty Crop Block Program, Farm Credit, lending support to agriculture and rural America.

The Maryland Soybean Board and Soybean Checkoff Program.

Progress powered by farmers.

The Maryland Nursery, Landscape and Greenhouse Association, The Maryland Association of Soil Conservation Districts.

The Maryland Farm Bureau Incorporated.

The Keith Campbell Foundation for the Environment.

The Maryland Agricultural Education Foundation, promoting the importance of agriculture in our daily lives.

And by Baltimore County Commission on Arts and Sciences.

(theme music playing).

(bird chirping).

JOANNE: Show me a successful farmer and I'll show you someone who's constantly learning and adapting.

Hi, I'm Joanne Clendining, welcome to "Maryland Farm and Harvest."

This week we're at Willowdale Farm, home to Dr. Michael Harrison's veterinary practice and a farm brewery operated by his son and son-in-law called "Farmacy," spelled with an F. Learning and adapting is at the very core of Farmacy at Willowdale Farm.

It's an example of understanding what's possible when you combine ordinary farm ingredients in an extraordinary way.

Plus, it's a fun place to visit.

Coming up, if you've thought about being a farmer but don't know where to start, this farmer training program might be for you.

But first, a family farm with a storied past reinvents itself as a vineyard, and the resulting wine combines soil science with personal preference.

(tractor engine).

Vineyards of Dodon in Davidsonville, Maryland planted their first vines in 2010.

On Anne Arundel County's largest working farm.

POLLY PITTMAN: Dodon is a 555-acre farm that is mostly under agricultural preservation.

We have had this farm off and on for now 10 generations.

JOANNE: Polly Pitman and her six siblings manage the Dodon Land Trust.

TOM CROGHAN: So we're in between rows of Cabernet Franc on my right and Merlot on my left.

JOANNE: Tom Croghan is Polly's business and life partner.

TOM: Well, Polly's dream was always to have retirement home on the farm.

POLLY: Tom and I had careers off the farm for most of our lives, and we're keen to think about sort of the third phase of our adulthood um, doing a big project here on the farm that would involve, um, making the farm productive.

TOM: This is our barrel room, it's 55 degrees, 75% humidity.

We've just bottled our 2022 vintage.

POLLY: It's been a huge learning curve in terms of understanding how to farm this site and how to do it in a way that's, uh, responsible regeneratively.

But, but thankfully Tom, with his science background, has been helping us understand the science of soil, the science of biodiversity, and helping us inform our decisions around, uh, farm management.

TOM: And the way we farm is about creating healthy vines.

There's nothing magical that goes on in the cellar.

JOANNE: Yep, no magic, but there is a lot of science.

Before Tom and Polly were winemakers, they were leaders in public health research.

In addition, Tom is a physician and research scientist whose focus is immunology, the study of what makes us sick.

TOM: That is hugely helpful when you're trying to manage a vineyard because when you're managing 31,000 vines like we have here at Dodon, it's like managing a small community.

JOANNE: Today he's checking on some of his current patients.

TOM: When I'm out scouting the vineyard, I'm of course looking at the ripeness of the fruit, but I'm looking for disease as well.

And this area right here you can see is a bit of leaf scorch that is characteristic of a bacterial disease called Pierce's.

And it is, uh, transmitted by an insect vector called sharpshooters.

Now, this is exactly where we would expect to see Pierce's disease, and it's because of what's right behind us.

JOANNE: Tom and Polly's public health experience has led them to a more holistic approach to managing their vineyard.

TOM: So down here is a riparian area.

It is preferred by the sharpshooter.

JOANNE: There is currently no known cure for the disease.

The standard treatment is insecticide sprays and removal of all affected vines, plus their unaffected neighbors.

Tom, the winemaker, sees large-scale financial damage in tackling a disease with no cure.

Tom, the immunologist sees another option, remove the insect that spreads the disease.

TOM: So we're gonna pull out all of this plant material and restore it with a semi-natural habitat that is conducive to the natural predators of the sharpshooters.

One of the things we've learned over the course of the vineyard is that perhaps the greatest challenge to a habitable earth is loss of biodiversity.

The more life you have around you, the more birds, the more insects, the more microbes in soil, which produce better flavor wine, but more importantly, they produce healthier plants.

So it is all about building that biodiversity to have a functioning ecosystem and ecosystems are really sort of self-regulating and they become more resilient.

And so part of our mission here is to restore that biodiversity, at least in what we can control in our small part of it.

Quinoa, Couscous!

Here, they come.

JOANNE: At Vineyards of Dodon, the small things are providing large rewards.

TOM: And so their purpose is clean up.

JOANNE: From Kune Kune pigs and goats that keep the grasses and weeds down.

TOM: We even use them as a fungicide delivery mechanism.

JOANNE: To the chickens nibbling up insects.

TOM: Chickens also like the spotted lantern fly.

JOANNE: Right down to the geese and their Great Pyrenees Willa protecting them all.

POLLY: The practices we've implemented have really changed the quality of the fruit.

So really looking at building health instead of treating disease or preventing disease as a mindset has been very helpful.

JOANNE: Vineyards of Dodon is blending public health and natural sciences to create fine wines and healthier habitats.

TOM: And so it's really what makes this place unique and gives it its own character.

I won't ever tell you that our wine is better than any of our neighbors, but it's different and we find it quite pleasurable.

JOANNE: All the hours of care and toil that the Dodon team have logged is paying off.

They've been nominated by "Wine Enthusiast Magazine" as American Winery of the Year.

They're up against several California vineyards, so cross your fingers and toes that Dodon can bring that award to Maryland.

Check our website for updates.

♪ ♪ All right, it's time to put your agricultural thinking caps on.

Here is our thingamajig for the week.

Do you think you know what it is?

Well, here's a hint.

When you're storing food for the winter, this tool can hang with the best of them.

Stay tuned and we'll have the answer at the end of the show.

Farm animals come in all shapes and sizes from livestock to pets, they're a ubiquitous presence on just about all farms.

Here are some picks of our favorite four-legged friends.

Enjoy.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ JOANNE: Show of hands, how many of you wanna be a farmer?

Well, you're not alone.

A recent report from FFA shows there are a million new memberships of young farmers, and among them is Sam Phelps, a young man who believes farming is his future.

(tractor engine).

In 2022, the average age of the American farmer had risen to 58 years old, a troubling statistic indicating that fewer and fewer Americans are providing fresh food to local economies.

But a surprising new trend emerged as well.

SAM PHELPS: We got the salad mix, potatoes, tomatoes, and basil, I'm not gonna charge you for the squash.

So the total $16.

AMANDA TURNER: We don't have our own labels yet, it's, it's homey.

People think that this is, they know it's from us.

JOANNE: Sam Phelps and his wife are first generation farmers.

They're among the many Gen Zers who are cultivating a love for the land.

The last few years have seen a roughly 10% increase in the number of farmers under 35.

SAM: The short answer is that I love it.

That's why I keep farming.

I just love doing it.

And the desire to really intentionally care for the soil and the place where we live, even though it's so small, it's only two acres, but these two acres are the ones that I have any say in how they're managed.

JOANNE: When Sam's subsistence farm grew over the pandemic, he realized he lacked the knowledge needed to provide for his growing customer base.

And with the hopes to expand another five acres, Sam felt a little overwhelmed.

SAM: We were in over our heads, so I just reached out to a bunch of local farms and said, "Can I come work for you?

I need to learn what I'm doing.

I need to see what you're doing."

JOANNE: In his search, Sam discovered a unique course called The Beginning Farmers Training Program conducted by the nonprofit, Future Harvest.

In this program, beginning farmers are mentored by a more established producer.

JACK GURLEY: The plan is we're gonna put out some buckwheat cover crop, we're gonna pick some winter squash, some cherry tomatoes, and do some work in the greenhouse.

Buckwheat is a what you call a smother cover crop.

So we will out compete the weeds.

It's pretty short-lived.

It's only about 30 days.

Broadcasting the buckwheat like this is sufficient, given a little bit of rain, uh, for it to germinate pretty quickly.

JOANNE: Sam's mentors Jack and Beckie Gurley of Calvert's Gift Farm are also the founders of this training program.

BECKIE GURLEY: We don't use a lot of equipment here.

We don't have a lot of expenses.

JACK: And I want to train people, "Hey, you can do this."

You don't have to have a $250,000 tractor, and all you really need is a small piece of land and you can actually do it.

BECKIE: And if we could train more farmers, it could only improve our community.

GRACE LEATHERMAN: Farmers learn best from other farmers.

People learn best with hands-on education.

JOANNE: Grace Leatherman is the executive director of Future Harvest, which has helped pair over 400 budding farmers with mentors and raise thousands of dollars for farm startup grants.

GRACE: The people who we are training are growing food in the context of the Chesapeake Bay region, so it's very important that they're learning from other farmers who are also farming in that context.

It's not the same if you're learning from someone who's growing in a different part of the country.

There are specific ways that you grow here in this region and also specific ways that this region is changing.

So it's very important that you're learning from the farmers who are experiencing those changes as well.

JACK: This is a silt loam, so this is drains especially well.

So in droughty conditions like we've had this summer, it's, uh, difficult to get plants established in, into.

SAM: What kind of crops will do better in the clay soil?

JACK: Anything that's in the ground for a long time or anything that, that you not gonna have a lot of irrigation on.

JOANNE: Working on Calvert's Gift Farm has also provided Sam valuable firsthand experience with some basic farm structures.

BECKIE: We really use them for season extension and for some disease control.

So these tomatoes we can harvest longer and the tomatoes look a little bit better than they do coming out of the field.

JOANNE: And Sam has applied this experience to his own construction of a hoop house.

SAM: When we put it up, I didn't fully realize all the things it needed to do and all the ways it needed to work, uh.

So now that I've worked there a few years, I have a better idea of what it needs to be able to do.

This is definitely not, uh, OSHA compliant.

JOANNE: Hundreds of first gen farmers like Sam have found the Beginning Farmers Training Program to be the catalyst for their agricultural success.

Sam's even planning to add five more acres to his farm if demand continues to grow.

SAM: And so I've learned so much from them, they've really been mentors for me and to all of us.

JACK: Beckie and I have been farming for almost 30 years, um, and we've had the training program for at least 20 of those years.

The relationships that have been created, people that trained with us 15 years ago popped back up again.

That's been especially meaningful to me.

SAM: I knew a couple tricks at one point, but... JOANNE: While the average age of farmers continues to rise, new passionate farmers like Sam signal a hopeful shift for the future.

And with mentors like Jack and Beckie, their growth might just be a site to behold.

GRACE: So we, we wanna make sure that as, as we've done historically with this program, that young people realize that there is land in this region to be farmed, that there are ways to build a career in sustainable agriculture, and we wanna make sure we're connecting them with those farmers who have the knowledge to do it.

JOANNE: The future of agriculture is in the hands of folks like Sam, and organizations like Future Harvest are helping to give them a leg up.

Congrats to you all.

Coming up, Al Spoler satisfies his sweet tooth all natural.

But first recent studies show a shift in the demographics of agriculture.

On this week's "Then and Now" we look at the evolution of diversity of underserved communities.

(wind howling).

♪ ♪ JOANNE: Cultural diversity in Maryland agriculture is deeply rooted in the state's history.

The state's agricultural landscape has long been shaped by a mix of European settlers, enslaved Africans, and more recently immigrant communities, each contributing unique farming practices, crops, and traditions.

Historically, African American farmers were instrumental in the development of Maryland's agricultural sector, particularly in the production of tobacco.

Despite facing challenges such as land loss and limited access to resources, African American farmers continue to be a significant part of Maryland's agricultural heritage.

In more recent years, Maryland has experienced an influx of immigrant communities, often focusing on niche crops that cater to ethnic markets and community needs.

Urban agriculture in cities like Baltimore, is increasingly seen as a tool for community empowerment, food access and local economic development.

Today, efforts to preserve farming traditions alongside initiatives to support these farmers are being made through programs like land preservation and educational outreach.

Through these initiatives, Maryland is embracing a future where its agricultural landscape is shaped by the contributions and traditions of a diverse, multicultural population.

On this week's, "The Local Buy," Al visits an urban beekeeper and lends a hand with the honey harvest, as long as his bee suit keeps the stingers at bay, Al?

♪ ♪ AL SPOLER: Over 25% of crops worldwide owe their pollination to honeybees, making it one of the most important insects in the world.

And their honey production means their role in the food network cannot be overstated.

But Kairi Dukes and the John Newman Honeybee Company aren't only harvesting honey.

They see raising bees as an art form that can connect African Americans to their agricultural roots and heal generational trauma.

KAIRI DUKES: Our beekeeping in general, has a real artistry about it.

The more people can be around them, sort of like in more comfortable settings, the more they can learn to appreciate the beauty of them, they vibrate, they do little dances and stuff.

It, um, gives people sort of like a more whimsical look at nature.

AL: I wanted to learn more about the ethos behind the John Newman Honeybee Company, so I came out here and got all suited up, now I'm gonna help with the harvest, and I wanna see firsthand how these hives flow with honey and history.

Kairi, hey man.

KAIRI: Hey, how's it going, Al?

AL: Okay, you getting down to business?

KAIRI: Yeah, you already know.

AL: I have no idea how this works, so this is a big education for me.

KAIRI: Oh, it's gonna be a lot of fun.

AL: All righty.

The first step in getting into the hive is to remove the outer and inner caps.

Right away you can see the busy colony hard at work.

KAIRI: This is one hive, hive number nine in my records, one of my favorites, but I don't know, they have a bit of a personality.

AL: Once the frame is lifted, all the bees need to be removed by carefully brushing them away.

KAIRI: You can just brush as much of them off as possible.

AL: Does that bother them or they just accept that as part of the job?

KAIRI: I'm a lot more gentle than a bear.

AL: Ah, you are.

KAIRI: They they, they, they take it as a, uh, occupational hazard.

AL: Mm-hmm.

KAIRI: You know?

AL: The John Newman Honeybee Company is taken from the two names of Kairi's grandfathers, but paying tribute to history goes even further than his direct lineage.

KAIRI: People of my background, we like to talk about our economic status within this country and going back throughout the history of this country and finding times where African Americans utilize hunting for honeybees, both in the wild and keeping honeybees on different farms, allowed them to gain a sort of personal autonomy within an otherwise, uh, confining society.

AL: And by reconnecting people to that history, Kairi believes there can be healing.

KAIRI: Harkens back to a time where people were able to live off the land that they occupied without infringement upon some outside source.

AL: Right, right.

KAIRI: And I think when Black people engage with beekeeping, it allows them to have memories of that so that we can ascribe for a life in modern times that emulates that.

AL: And while some people are surprised by an urban apiary in Curtis Bay, Kairi sees it as an opportunity to connect.

KAIRI: What makes the life of an urban beekeeper is love.

Uh, we're not off on like some massive alfalfa field somewhere, we're in the community.

Like people walk by ask what I'm doing.

It allows me to interact with them to not only remove their fear of honeybees just in that brief interaction but also give them like some of that same joy that I experience from being around the bees.

AL: Altogether, we've removed 30 frames from the hives.

Next, we'll take them to a commercial kitchen where the honey will be harvested.

Kairi, I have no idea how the honey gets from here into a little jar where it looks so pure and clean and everything.

KAIRI: Yeah, it is, uh, uh, pretty straightforward process.

AL: Is that right?

KAIRI: Yep, you know, we just have to uncap it.

AL: Mm-hmm.

KAIRI: Spin it in the spinner, and then we release it down to, to the bucket when the spinners full and then we jar it up and... AL: That's it?

KAIRI: Yeah, yeah, simplest recipe you ever dealt with.

So here, uh, have you ever cut a bagel like with your hand, like this?

AL: Sure, of course, yeah.

KAIRI: Ok, so it's basically like that you wanna, uh, keep the blade as flat as you can.

AL: Mm-hmm.

KAIRI: And other stuff.

AL: It's sticky.

KAIRI: Oh, yeah, yeah, everything will be sticky.

AL: Is this good?

KAIRI: You just come... yep, in a smooth saw motion right against it.

Yep, that's good see?

Mesmerizing, isn't it?

AL: It is.

Once the wax cappings are sawed off, they go into the spinner, where the centrifugal force will remove the honey from the bee frames and be ready to bottle up.

The only thing left to do is to return the frames to the hive and say goodbye to Kairi and the bees.

Well, Kairi, I can't thank you enough for having me by today.

I can't tell you how much I've learned from the bees.

It's just amazing.

KAIRI: Yeah, yeah, I, I love 'em.

Honeybees, especially for the Black community, are much like a forgotten memory.

AL: Mm-hmm.

KAIRI: The more we learn about them in the modern day, the more we integrate 'em, the more we learn about ourselves.

AL: Yeah, yeah, where can we get your honey?

KAIRI: Yeah, so you can get it online at the website at johnnewmanhoneybeeco.com.

AL: Mm-hmm.

KAIRI: You can also purchase it through Instagram or Facebook at the John Newman Honeybee Company.

AL: Oh, that's great.

Well, we're gonna put all that information on the website at mpt.org/farm, so you can look into it.

For "The Local Buy," I'm Al Spoler, Joanne?

JOANNE: Thanks, Al.

Be sure to check out mpt.org/farm for all our recipes and resources.

Plus you can watch all "Farm and Harvest" episodes there as well.

Also, don't forget to follow us on social media for show updates, pictures, and videos.

Now, hold on, we're not done yet.

Remember our thingamajig, did you guess it?

Our hint was when you're storing food for the winter, this tool can hang with the best of 'em.

This is a Can Rake, a once popular tool among canneries in Maryland for transporting and storing cans quickly and efficiently.

Congratulations if you got it right.

Join us next week for another thingamajig along with more stories about the diverse, passionate people who feed our state.

I'm Joanne Clendining, thanks for watching.

(music plays through credits).

NARRATOR: Major funding for "Maryland Farm and Harvest" is made possible in part by the Maryland Grain Producers Utilization Board, investing in smarter farming to support safe and affordable food, feed and fuel, and a healthy Bay.

Additional funding provided by Maryland's Best.

Good for you, good for Maryland.

MARBIDCO, helping to sustain food and fiber enterprise for future generations.

A grant from the Maryland Department of Agriculture Specialty Crop Block Program, Farm Credit, lending support to agriculture and rural America.

The Maryland Soybean Board and Soybean Checkoff Program.

Progress powered by farmers.

The Maryland Nursery, Landscape and Greenhouse Association, The Maryland Association of Soil Conservation Districts.

The Maryland Farm Bureau Incorporated.

The Keith Campbell Foundation for the Environment.

The Maryland Agricultural Education Foundation, promoting the importance of agriculture in our daily lives.

And by Baltimore County Commission on Arts and Sciences.

(bird chirping).