This week on the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we're talking with a familiar name to our readers, Sue Bowman.
Bowman has a cow-calf farm in Lebanon County and has been writing for Lancaster Farming for 20-plus years.
Bowman's farm has been in her family since the early 1890s, and is in a unique spot in the county, with most of the 106 acres located within the borough of Cleona.
Due to the farm's location and the threat of development, Bowman got the farm preserved in 2002.
"We actually became the 6,000th acre in Lebanon County that was preserved," she said. "It was something we wanted to do and we have never regretted it."
In addition to farming, Bowman is a Lancaster Farming correspondent and writes a weekly column, Rural Ramblings, that runs in the B section.
"Sometimes I feel like my column is about nothing, in a way, nothing special," Bowman said. "I like to take little everyday events that I think other people could identify with and write about them."
When Bowman was asked to write a weekly column years ago, she said she first had to confirm that she could also continue writing articles, something she really enjoys.
Bowman writes a lot of features for B section, often focusing on history.
"The nicest people that I've ever met are people that I've met through Lancaster Farming doing articles about them," Bowman said.
Bowman was born into farming, but she said when she was younger it wasn't a novelty to be a farm kid, and it also wasn't necessarily something to be proud of.
But as she's gotten older, her relationship to the farming industry has evolved.
"It's something I'm proud of now in my later years to say 'yeah, I live on a 106-acre preserved farm,'" Bowman said.
You can read more from the articles discussed in the episode here:
Why Farm Women Should Pay Attention to Their Own Biological Cycles [Opinion]
New Jersey Cranberry Farm Wades Through Harvest Season
