May 8 – Western Water Rights 101 for Ag Advisors – 10am-Noon PT on Zoom – View recording
With Amanda Cronin from (AMP Insights), we’ll break down water rights fundamentals across WA, OR, and CA for western ag advisors. You’ll gain practical tools to support growers with questions like:
- Do I have a water right—and how can I find out?
- What can I legally use water for, and how much?
- What if I don’t have a water right?
- Is it realistic to apply for a new water right?
While you won’t be a water rights expert in two hours, you will walk away with practical tools and region-specific insights to help your growers navigate tough questions.
04/24 Rainwater Harvesting in Action – 10-11:30am PT on Zoom – View recording
Hear directly from farmers Michelle Week (Good Rain Farm) and Nate Johnson (Sunbow Produce) as they share their experiences designing and using rainwater harvesting systems to build resilience. This session will spotlight practical strategies and lessons learned from growers adapting to increasingly unpredictable water access.
02/05/25 – 9am-Noon – 10th Annual Virtual Dry Farming Collaborative Winter Convening
12/08/24 – Sagra del Radiccho – 3-6pm – The Redd on Salmon
Come taste, learn, and experience the diversity of locally grown winter vegetables and grains that often go unappreciated. This event is a journey into the world of underdog crops! DFI will be tabling at this event to feature dry-farmed pomodori d’inverno or winter tomatoes. These tomatoes were harvested in September and best eaten in the fall and winter months. Chef Timothy Wastell will be preparing dishes highlighting these tomatoes to taste and DFI will have some of these tomatoes available for sal
November 2024 – Virtual Western Water Resilience Workshops: Empowering Ag Advisors to Partner with Small-Scale Growers
When: Thursdays, 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM (PST)
Dates: November 7th, 14th, 21st, December 5th (No session during Thanksgiving week)
09/22/24 – Water Resilience Demo – Kasama Farm – Gresham
Explore reduced tillage and dry farming on a weedy site. Kasama Farm is a 1 acre no till vegetable farm specializing in growing Filipino, Southeast Asian, and East Asian vegetables for the diaspora using traditional farming methods.
09/08/24 – Variety Showcase 2024 – Culinary Breeding Network – Portland, OR
Come learn, taste, and engage! This public event brought to you by Culinary Breeding Network is designed to build community among plant breeders, seed growers, farmers, chefs, bakers, distillers, retailers, distributors and consumers interested in the local food system. The 2024 Variety Showcase will have a special emphasis on culinary grains and dry-farming.
08/30/24 – Water Resilience Demo – Siletz Community Health Clinic Farm – Logsden – 10am – 3pm
Join us for a day of on-farm examples of water resilience and connecting with community. The Siletz Community Health Clinic Farm will demonstrate their rainwater catchment system and irrigation strategies for limited water resources in a coastal influenced river valley. Their various strategies for tillage, field preparations, dry farming techniques, and species selection for growing successful crops will be shared.
08/22/24 – OSU Southern Oregon Research and Extension Center – OSU Dry Farming Program – Central Point – 8:30-10:30am
The Southern Oregon Research and Extension Center (SOREC) is showcasing a melon variety trial that includes five top performing dry farm melon varieties, irrigated in 4 different ways. Join this field day to learn how to utilize soil moisture sensors to reduce irrigation usage, and taste the difference between delicious melon varieties grown with different amounts of water.
08/14/24 – Water Resilience Demo – Oak Creek Center for Urban Horticulture – OSU Dry Farming Program – Corvallis – 5-7pm
This is the OSU Dry Farming Field Day at Oak Creek, where all plots are dry farmed. Featured this year are no-till vs. tilled tomatoes, melons, and melon cucumbers, as well as demonstration plots of flowers, perennials, forages, and intercropping of legumes with corn and sorghum.
08/07/24 – Water Resilience Demo – Raptor Creek Farm – Josephine County Food Bank – Grants Pass – 9-11am –
This field tour will showcase water management and sustainable practices designed to enhance drought resistance and improve water efficiency. Participants will explore cultivation of eggplant, winter squash, and watermelon using methods such as paper mulch, biochar, straw mulching, and intercropping with beneficial plants. The tour will highlight irrigation systems, soil moisture monitoring tools, and water conservation strategies in action.
08/09/24 – Water Resilience Demo – WWU Outback Farm – Bellingham – 3-5pm
Outback Farm will showcase their unique experimental farm where students learn about growing vegetables, herbs, fruit, and caring for chickens and bees. As a teaching facility, and a mutual aid/food justice oriented farm, it’s critical for Outback to try agricultural techniques that can keep up with a changing climate. Explore demonstrations of three types of mulching techniques, use of moisture sensors to guide our irrigation routine, terraces and contouring, and permaculture practices for a more water-resilient future.
07/24/24 – Water Resilience Demo for Farmers – UW Farm – Seattle – 6-8pm
The UW Farm welcomes farmers on the 24th to self-guided tours and discussions with farm managers of our demonstrations of water conservation approaches. Explore the use of different mulches and composts; dry farmed crops including rye, potatoes, tomatoes and beans; use of computerized, drip irrigation; cover cropping; fungal applications; and use of moisture meters.
Thursday, October 19th 2023, 5:30-7:30pm: MRWC Pub Talk at Common Fields in Corvallis, OR
Mary’s River Watershed Council’s October Pub Talk at Common Fields (545 SW 3rd St, Corvallis, OR 97333) will be on Dry Farming: What is it and how does it affect our watershed? with Amy Garrett (DFI) and Nate Johnson (Sunbow Produce).
Monday, November 6th, 2023 11am – 3pm: Deep Roots Coalition 2023 PDX Trade Tasting at The Redd. Note: This tasting is only open to members of the wine industry. DFI is partnering with the Culinary Breeding Network and chef Timothy Wastell to highlight dry-farmed winter tomatoes. We will also share information about dry farming, and our collective work to increase knowledge, access, and awareness of varieties that do well, and taste amazing dry-farmed while enhancing the resiliency of our food system.
October 7, 2023: Water Resilience Learning Circle in Central Point, OR
American Farmland Trust’s (AFT) Veteran Women for the Land in the PNW program will host a Water Resilience Learning Circle in Central Point, OR, with OSU Extension and the Dry Farming Institute.
September 16, 2023 from 11-3pm: The Tomato Festival (3rd Annual!) at Wellspent Market (935 NE Couch St, Portland, OR 97232)
The Culinary Breeding Network, Oregon State University (Dry Farming Project & Vegetable Breeding Program), the Dry Farming Institute (DFI). There will be a diverse array of tomatoes (many dry-farmed!) to try, learn about and buy. DFI will have an assortment of dry-farmed tomatoes and melons for sale and educational materials available. Come see us!
September 6, 2023 from 3-6pm: Dry Farming Field Day at North Willamette Research and Extension Center (NWREC), Wilsonville, OR
Join us outside for an afternoon focused on dry farmed vegetables. There will be field demonstrations of crops that thrive without the aid of irrigation, such as tomatoes, melons, and winter squash. Learn from farmers and researchers as they discuss dry farming vegetables in the Willamette Valley. There will be field tours of the different crops grown in the new agrivoltaic plot (solar panels) as well as out in the control plots. NRCS and SWCD conservationists will be present to share information about programs that support farmers. This event is for farmers of all small-scale vegetable farmers, but is specifically designed to benefit farmers with at least three years of experience.
August 31,2023 from 5:30pm-7:30pm: Dry Farming Field Day at OSU Vegetable Research Farm, Corvallis, OR
This field day will feature OSU experiments on dry farm culinary corn breeding, management of blossom-end rot in dry farmed tomatoes, and dry farmed melon and dry bean variety trials. There will be dry farmed melon and tomato tasting at this event!
August 23, 2023 from 4-6 pm: Dry Farming Field Day at the Oak Creek Center for Urban Horticulture, Corvallis, OR
This year their demo includes a variety trial of diverse crops that are traditionally dry farmed in northern Africa and the Middle East, including sorghum, sesame, millet, cowpea, melon and African rice. Furthermore, they will be demonstrating different tillage and interplanting practices in a dry farmed context. Other featured dry farmed crops will include winter squash, potatoes, tomatoes, melons, and cucumbers – there will be plenty of tasty dry farmed tomatoes and melons to try as well!
February 8, 2022 from 9 -12pm: Dry Farming Collaborative Winter Convening (Hosted by OSU Dry Farming Project)
September 11, 2022 from 12 – 3pm: Tomato Fest (hosted by Culinary Breeding Network and Wellspent Market) in Portland. DFI tabled here to do outreach and education on dry farming and pomodoro d’inverno, which are tomatoes which are traditionally dry farmed in Italy, stored and eaten in the winter months. DFI has dry farmed them in Oregon for the past couple of years, harvested in September, stored them through the winter months, and offered them at various outreach events.
April 2, 2022 from 11am–3pm: Agrarian Sharing Network (ASN) Propagation Fair Outdoors at Emerald Park (1400 Lake Ave., Eugene, OR): ASN is a decentralized, collaborative network focused on distributing plant diversity to friends and neighbors and creating a shareable reproducible model for others to implement. Don’t miss their last propagation fair of the year! DFI sponsored the drought tolerant rootstock for this event.
May 7, 2022: Willamette Valley Hardy Plant Group – Annual Plant Sale. DFI tabled at this event and have starts and/or seeds of top-performing varieties (tomato, squash, melon, bean, corn) from dry farm trials in Western Oregon.
August 26, 2021 – OSU Dry Farming Project Field Day – Corvallis, OR
“Why Buy Dry?” – Washington Water Trust informational and tasting table at the Wallingford Farmers Market with in Seattle, WA on July 21st and 28th 2021.
6th Annual Dry Farming Collaborative Winter Meeting – February 26, 2021. A virtual event for farmers and gardeners organized by the Oregon State University Dry Farming Project, with invited speakers sponsored by the Dry Farming Institute
Adaptive Ag Water Symposium – November 6th 2020. A virtual event with three presentations. As Oregon and other western states deal with drier growing seasons and higher wildfire risks, it is critical to increase our knowledge of how to grow more food with less water, design for enhanced water retention and infiltration, understand the future of water law in Oregon, as well as how to protect farms and crops using green fire breaks.