Monday's agricultural website - Food Dialogues #FoodD

Today's agriculture website to share is for the Food Dialogues town hall meeting that will be occurring later this week. Americans have a lot of questions about how food is raised, the impact on their health and the health of the planet. In an effort organized by the US Farmers and Ranchers Alliance, the Food Dialogues will be this Thursday, September 22, beginning at 11:30am EDT. This is a part of a new effort by the alliance to bring together different viewpoints on farming and ranching and the future of food to solve our most challenging problems. People can participate by watching the conversations through a webcast on FoodDialogues.com or by using the Facebook application.

(Full disclosure: I will be attending the town hall meeting in Washington, D.C. live and will be tweeting about the talk Thursday. Follow the #FoodD tag on twitter.)

Monday's agriculture website - Farmer Bloggers

Have you ever wondered what happens on the farm?  Do you want to know how the milk gets from the cow to you?  What does a rancher ride the prairie for?  If you've ever wondered about this or other farm and food questions, head over to the Farmers Blog, a collection of farmer blogs in  "one stop shop" setting.

The group of blogs consists of several farms and ranches from the California Valleys and Mountains to the Midwest plains, organic, conventional, large, small, grain, livestock and more.   Click here to see a complete list of the farmers and their backgrounds.

Monday's agriculture website - Common Ground

When it comes to getting information, what's better than going to the source? A group of farm women have come together and formed the group called Common Ground. The goal of the women is to start a conversation between the women who grow food, and the women who buy it. The website shares recipes and events where consumers can meet farm women. The site also lists food facts and their reference sources.

Don't forget to give #foodthanks

Food doesn’t just happen. It takes an incredible number of caring, thoughtful, hard-working individuals to provide the food for the meals we enjoy every day. From farmer to processor to truck driver to chef to retailer, millions work hard to provide our food.

Those people deserve our thanks, especially during the Thanksgiving holiday. Please remember to give #foodthanks this week on your blog, facebook pages, and twitter, especially on Wednesday, November 24.

I want to take the opportunity to personally thank each and every person for helping to provide the food myself and my family will consume for our Thanksgiving meal. I know there are a lot of hands involved and my thanks go to every one of you. Thank you for providing a safe, affordable, nutritious product. I am also proud of the small role I play in helping to bring food to the table of many families. It makes me proud to say that I help farmers take care of their animals so they can feed people.

Regardless of who produced your food or how it got to you, I hope we can agree that they all deserve our thanks. As you sit down for your Thanksgiving meal this week, please remember to give #foodthanks.


P.S. For those of you on twitter, #foodthanks is the hashtag to express your gratitude there as well.

Monday's agriculture website of interest: AGPROUD

Are you involved in some way with agriculture and farming? Are you "agproud"? Today's agriculture website of interest to share with readers is the Agriculture Proud site, sharing the story of all people who help produce food.

Being Agriculture Proud simply involves telling your agriculture story. The site encourages farmers to explain why are you proud to be a part of agriculture. A few key points of emphasis are:

• Be real and authentic about your passion for Agriculture
• Show the enthusiasm for your passion
• Keep it simple and to the point
• Make it a candid point of view (everything in life is not flowers and sunshine)
• Stick to your experience. You can’t defend everyone

The site is maintained by Ryan Goodman, a Texas cattleman with a desire to make agriculture's voice heard. You can find Ryan as @AR_Ranchhand on Twitter.

Monday's agriculture website of interest: #AGCHAT FOUNDATION

*For those new to the Cow Art and More blog, every Monday, veterinarian, jewelry artist, and gallery owner Kathy Swift shares an agricultural themed website with readers.*

I am excited to share today's agriculture related website with everyone, the Agchat Foundation. This foundation was formed to help farmers and ranchers use social media to tell their stories to the 98.5 percent of the population not engaged in the production of food, feed, fuel and fiber. I am proud to say that I have been a part of the weekly #agchat discussion group on twitter that discusses issues facing agriculture on a wide range of topics since its inception one year ago. I have made many friends as a result and feel empowered to help agriculture at more than just my local level.

I am also proud to say that I was asked and accepted a position to be on the Agchat Foundation board of directors. I am looking forward to helping farmers get their story in front of consumers. I invite everyone to view the Agchat Foundation website and join us in the conversation on twitter, Tuesday evenings, from 8 to 10 PM ET. (Follow @agchat to learn the details of the topics and how to join in.)