Don’t get me started on invasive species like phragmites being introduced in South Florida. We have had to make some hard decisions on the farm: poison the bugs killing our Hemlocks or release zombie beetles to eat the tree-killing beetles… it’s an ongoing battle. In Maryland they are trying to turn an invasive issue into a landscape-saving win. Read more here.
While we can’t literally look out our backdoors to see vast swaths of nature….still, living on the Cumberland Plateau, there is so much to appreciate. We’re a biological hotspot of diversity and there’s the water. Paddling… we love it. Here’s an example of one day on the creek. Here’s a story I wrote about the…
If you live in Florida, you know that fire ants are bad, bad news. They are particularly bad news for the ground-nesting Florida Grasshopper Sparrow. There’s some good news for the Sparrow, too. Though endangered, scientists have raised and released 100 chicks into the wild. Fire ants have made their way to the Cumberland Plateau;…
We love our working farm, from the cattle to the trees, from the mushrooms to the bees. But the farm doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It exists in a beautiful biologically diverse system. So we work to improve farm productivity and environment, and support land restoration efforts, while we support the work to do the…
Coal Creek Farm is special. Over the years we’ve learned a lot about the tension between economic viability and environmental enhancement. We’ve learned that while you sometimes have to choose, more often they are complementary. In the last few weeks a group of people, environmentalists, landowners, government, non-profit and education have successfully closed an effort…
Coal Creek Farm has rolling hills, flowing water, flora and fauna, and clear cuts. Such beauty contrasted with such abuse. For years, as I drove by those clear-cut trees, I was troubled by the look of it. I knew that the land couldn’t be put into productivity and wasn’t providing much in the way of…
Coal Creek Farm started my love affair with Tennessee. I’ve loved the farm, and I’ve learned so much about hemlock trees and zombie beetles, about controlled burns and uncontrolled invasives (this is bad in every form.) Thanks to the farm, we started to make business investments in Knoxville, Nashville, and Chattanooga.