Farm Seekers!  This One's for YOU. SILT Farmer Survey SILT's first-ever survey of sustainable food farmers seeking land could help us educate landowners and garner more farming opportunities for you - but only with your help! Take 5 and together let's find you a farm!

SILT Executive Director Suzan Erem addresses the audience between performances. Nearly 100 people attended SILT's first Spring Thaw Concert at The Mill in Iowa City March 30 to hear Dave Moore, Steve and Michaela McLain and a surprise appearance by Randy Davis. The concert filled the house as guests enjoyed free ReUnion Brewery beer and Wild Culture Kombucha while supplies lasted thanks to sponsorships by those to companies. Musician Greg Brown, who was playing at the Englert later that evening, came by for the first part of the show. SILT also debuted its first Raygun T-Shirts which [...]

More than 100 people packed The Mill in Iowa City in March to support the Sustainable Iowa Land Trust and listen to great music by folk legend Dave Moore and rising stars Steve and Michaela McLain. "The ACLU raised $24 million the week after Trump was elected," SILT Executive Director Suzan Erem told the crowd. "That's $24 million that didn't go to groups fighting hunger, homelessness or even farmland protection for the future. The current polarization we are witnessing in America is sucking us dry spiritually, morally and financially." SILT was able to raise a record amount of funds [...]

The SILT/Awful Purdies collaboration of a music video about farm transfer was featured in a recent edition of Little Village Magazine in Johnson County. The video has sparked discussions across Iowa and a number of calls and emails to SILT asking how to protect land permanently. Interested in getting the word out in your community? Connect us with your local media. We'll be glad to talk!

[vc_row][vc_column width="1/2"][vc_column_text]An avalanche of land transfer is beginning in Iowa as people who've accumulated the most wealth in this nation's history pass it on to the next generation. But many "farm kids" have moved away from the land their families own, and look to housing developers* or the farmer** next door as likely buyers. This perfect storm is causing today's farm crisis, the result of which will determine what America's landscape, food system and public health will look like for centuries to come. In fewer than 5 minutes, SILT's first music video, illustrates this complicated issue and one permanent, multi-faceted solution [...]

Wittrig family establishes Iowa’s first sustainable food production conservation easement Pioneering arrangement will preserve 130 acres in perpetuity John Wittrig with his daughter Laura and long-time friend Tom Wahl on his 130 acres in Washington County now permanently protected to grow healthy food. 13 November 2017—John Wittrig and his family just made Iowa history. They’ve created the state’s first agricultural conservation easement permanently protecting 130 acres of their farm for sustainable food production, something only the newest land trust in Iowa offers. Wittrig grew up on the family farm in not far from Winfield, the town in which [...]

Paul Johnson, former head of the Natural Resource Conservation Service under President Bill Clinton discussing Lyle Luzum's farm. Former presidential appointee and Iowa legislator Paul Johnson explained at SILT's annual Land Protector Recognition Dinner Nov. 16, that there are three things that make up our soil - clay, silt and sand. Clay and sand are both extremely difficult to grow anything in, he said, but "SILT binds it all together." That's what SILT did that night, bringing together rural and urban, local food lovers, farmers and environmentalists for a celebratory night honoring Lyle Luzum and his family from [...]