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Iowa couple wins Sustainable Ag recognition
Published Monday, October 26, 2009 at 12:08 PM
AMES, Iowa -- Francis and Susan Thicke, whose Radiance Farm organic dairy products are marketed in the Fairfield area, have earned this year’s Spencer Award for Sustainable Agriculture. The couple’s commitment to resource conservation, successful grazing management, and economically profitable dairy production led to their selection for one of Iowa’s largest awards in sustainable agriculture.

The Thickes will receive the honor, which carries a $1,000 stipend, on December 5 at the 2009 Iowa Organic Conference in Ames from the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture. Director Jerry DeWitt, who received the award in 2005, said “In addition to their dairy operation with its strong foundation in environmentally-sound practices, the Thickes have made many contributions to the wider cause of sustainable agriculture by speaking out for family farmers and through the work Francis has done on the USDA State Technical Committee. Their impacts range far beyond the farm gate.”

The Jefferson County couple has given many community tours of their 236-acre farm, where 60 paddocks are used to feed their herd of 80 Jersey milk cows. The herd is rotationally grazed, moving to a new paddock twice daily. In their on-farm processing plant, they produce skim, low-fat and whole milk, as well as yogurt and cheese, all of which are sold locally. “We don’t really own the land, the land owns us,” says Francis Thicke. Using ecological systems as their model, they converted their farm landscape from corn and soybean production to perennial grasses and legumes. These changes have helped restore the hilly fields to lush pastures with healthy soil. The perennials have deep root systems, which easily absorb rain. The Thickes have planted walnuts, hybrid hazelnuts, white pines and a variety of fruit trees as an investment in future land health.

Off the farm, Francis Thicke was chosen as a Policy Fellow for the W.K. Kellogg Foundation Food and Society program, and before he returned to farming in 1996, he was the National Program Leader for soil science for the USDA-Extension Service in Washington, D.C. He currently serves on the board of directors of the Organic Farming Research Foundation.

The Thickes will be the sixth recipients of the Spencer Award, established in 2002 to honor farmers, educators or researchers who have made a significant contribution toward the stability of mainstream family farms in the state. They were chosen for the honor earlier in the year by a committee of the Leopold Center’s advisory board and past recipients of the award.

To see a gallery of photographs from their farm, go to the Leopold Center Web site at: www.leopold.iastate.edu/gallery/Radiance_Dairy/index.html ##

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