Debra Knapke

The Garden Sage | Columbus, Ohio

  • Debra Knapke is an educator, garden coach/designer, writer, horticulturist, speaker, gardener, and owner of The Garden Sage. Learn more at debrathegardensage.com.

Henry Peller

Rose Hill Farm | Roseville, Ohio

  • Henry Peller is a farmer at Rose Hill Farm (@rosehillnotill) and Living Willow Farm (@livingwillowfarm), which operate a diversified family farm and wildlife habitat in Roseville, Ohio. In the summertime, Henry grows melons and sweet corn for the local market using cover crops and homemade no-till equipment. In the winter and spring, he and his family harvest willows and add value to them with living and non-living projects around the country. Having earned a PhD in soil science at The Ohio State University, he understands how the vitality and function of soils are the foundation for any farm's success. Henry believes Ohio has an enormous opportunity to put soils at the center of agricultural policy, namely by creating market opportunities and incentivizing management practices that produce healthy soils.

Sophia Buggs

Lady Buggs Pharm | Youngstown, Ohio

  • Sophia L. Buggs, known as Lady Buggs, is the owner and land steward of Lady Buggs Pharm (@ladybuggspharm), a 1.3-acre urban farm located on the South Side of Youngstown, Ohio. She is reclaiming the sacred roots of farming through spiritual homesteading. Her areas of expertise are wildcrafting, plant medicine and fermenting traditional foods. Her mission is to regenerate her community by offering well-being from seed to table. Sophia serves as the Executive Director of Plant It You (“Planet You”) a grassroots organization dedicated to land stewardship, food as medicine sovereignty, climate action and Black and Indigenous farmers and foodways. She also serves as The Mahoning Food Access Initiative Director with Heathy Community Partnerships Healthy Food Retail Action Team and as the Co-Chair to Central Appalachia Network (CAN) Beginning Farmer Working Group. Sophia holds a Master of Education with a concentration in Curriculum and Instruction from American InterContinental University and a Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice from Bethune Cookman University. She also has earned a number of accreditations, which include a year of OJT Specialty Crop Apprenticeship through Goodness Grows, an organization that promotes food, faith, and sustainable farming for all, Market Garden Certifications with Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corporation, and a Certificate of Intuitive Plant Medicine with One Willow Apothecaries.

Jim Linne

White Clover Farm | Hillsboro, Ohio

  • Jim practiced gastroenterology for 35 years before purchasing a 300-acre farm in Hillsboro, Ohio in 2005. He transitioned it from a conventional corn and soybean rotation to permanent perennial pastures and hayfields. White Clover Farm is certified by the American Grassfed Association and produces 100% grass-fed beef which is direct marketed locally.

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Amanda Hernandez

Finca Taina | Yellow Springs, Ohio

  • Amanda Duprey Hernandez, originally from Puerto Rico, moved to Yellow Springs from Philadelphia. She graduated from Temple University with a bachelor’s in Global Security specializing in human security. Formerly the production farmer at Agraria, her journey in food justice began after she authored different papers on food insecurity- including one on food sovereignty movements in Puerto Rico post-hurricane Maria. Amanda was an AmeriCorps Vista who worked to increase food security in the Miami Valley region and continues her support for food justice through her work with the Hall Hunger Initiative. Amanda has also studied food and agricultural cooperatives in Cuba, is a founding member of the BIPOC Food and Farm Network, and has interned with the Ohio Ecological Food and Farm Association's policy team as a grassroots agricultural policy organizer. Amanda is also the farmer/owner of Finca Taina located on leased land at Agraria.

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Jim Ippolito

The Ohio State University | Columbus, Ohio

  • Dr. Jim Ippolito is a Rattan Lal Endowed Professor of Soil Health and Soil Fertility. His 30+ year career has focused on improving environmental soil fertility/chemistry/microbiology/soil health within agricultural, shortgrass steppe, grazed, burned, and metal-contaminated mined-land ecosystems.  His research program connects the intimate linkages between soil macro- and micro-nutrients, trace and heavy metals, microbiological activity, and soil physical attributes, and how these factors combine to influence ecosystem sustainability, resiliency, food, climate and environmental security.

Video Editing by John Umland. Contact at johnvumland@gmail.com.