LOUISVILLE, Ohio —In this rural Ohio town, a short drive from Canton, Mark Thomas had been running a 400-cow dairy farm for years. That, plus row-cropping 2,000 acres, kept him outside, where he wanted to be most days.

The second annual Hardin County Goat Banquet will be held on Saturday, March 30 at the Family Center of the Christian Missionary Alliance Church, 15436 Ohio 309, east of Kenton. Registration and seating will open at 5 p.m. with the public invited. Supper and the speaker will begin at 5:30 pm.

Hardin Soil and Water Conservation District (SWCD) supervisors and staff recently participated in the annual “Conservation Partnership Meeting” held in downtown Columbus. Attending were more than 500 conservation leaders representing Ohio’s 88 SWCDs and partners from the Ohio Department of Agriculture, USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) and Ohio Environmental Protection Agency.

There has been increased interest in people raising chickens to produce eggs locally. While backyard poultry operations are usually smaller in size, they create a list of new problems that must be addressed to successfully complete this type of agricultural enterprise.

The month of February was a busy one for the Kenton OHP FFA chapter. On Feb. 2, members Garrett Thomas and Devan Dulin competed in the Agriculture Industrial Diagnostics Systems contest at the John Deere training center in Plain City. The two placed eighth overall at the district level.

The High Flyers 4-H Club will meet on Tuesday, March 12 at 6:30 p.m. in the basement of Epworth Methodist Church in Kenton. Family guides and project enrollment will be discussed. New members are welcome.

When will this cold weather end so gardeners can go outside and begin the work they all enjoy? There are only so many seed catalogs and garden videos that you can look through while Mother Nature does her thing.

The Ohio Department of Agriculture, in partnership with the Hardin Soil and Water Conservation District, is providing funding for new assistance programs for farmers to help protect water quality in the western basin of Lake Erie.

The Hardin County Cattle Producers will hold their annual Beef Banquet on Saturday, March 23 in the Community Building at the fairgrounds, starting at 6 p.m. Pre-sale adult tickets are $15 ($20 at the door), youth ages 6-12 are $7.50 ($10 at the door), kids under 6 years old are free, and 2018 Hardin County Junior Fair Beef Barn Exhibitors are free with a reservation given to any Cattle Producers director. Please request pre-sale tickets by March 13.

COLUMBUS – In a move that will benefit Ohio’s farmers and agri-businesses, Ohio Treasurer Robert Sprague announced the implementation of a one percent minimum loan discount for the Ag-LINK program.