Local Oregon farmers are adapting to arid conditions by embracing water-resilient practices, including dry farming. Eliza Mason, owner of Lilliputopia farm in Monroe, has been using dry farming techniques since 2017. Her farm relies mostly on rainwater, with four 3,000-gallon tanks collecting runoff from the greenhouse roof.

Dry Farming as a Solution

Dry farming, an all-encompassing term for production of crops without agricultural irrigation during dry seasons, is not a novel idea. Teagan Moran, outreach program coordinator with the Oregon State University’s Small Farms Program, notes that dry farming has been practiced across the globe, from the Mediterranean Basin to the American Southwest.

Moran has worked with the OSU Dry Farming Program and the Dry Farming Collaborative, a network promoting dry farming through hands-on research. The program was established in 2013 as a climate adaptation strategy for growers facing water scarcity.

Building a Dry Farming Network

The nonprofit Dry Farming Institute was established in 2019 to expand on the work done by the Dry Farming Initiative. Cassandra Waterman, communications and outreach director for the Dry Farming Institute, has put together a Water Resilience Toolkit to help growers map out drought strategies based on local conditions.

The toolkit was released on August 4, and the initiative organizes and leads field tours at showcase sites, where people interested in dry farming can see what it really looks like in practice. Waterman also highlighted a project aimed at middle schools, where students collect soil and crop samples and are sent home with seeds to implement in their school gardens.

Original reporting: Homepage – Lookout Eugene-Springfield — read the source article.