Ohio's Conservation Farm Family Awards will honour six families this year instead of the traditional five, after the programme added a small-farms category, Ohio Farmer editor Jennifer Kiel writes in Farm Progress. The message, she says, is that conservation excellence knows no acreage boundary — whether a family farms 50 acres or 5,000.

The 2026 winners are Jim and Susan Braddock of Fredericktown in Knox County; Bill Kellogg and his children Shane and Jacinta of Forest in Hardin County; Don and Anne Hammersmith of Defiance in Defiance County; Neil and Pamela McKown with their son Sam of Shelby in Richland County; Turpin Farms, run by siblings Pam Simmons and Robert "Turp" Fischer of Cincinnati in Hamilton County; and Mike and Maria Wolfe of Baltimore in Fairfield County.

The award was founded by Ohio Farmer magazine and is now coordinated by the Ohio Department of Agriculture, with the magazine, the Ohio Federation of Soil and Water Conservation Districts and the Ohio Farm Bureau Federation as co-sponsors. Winners are chosen for protecting soil, water and related natural resources on their own land and for sharing what they have learned with other farmers and the public.

All six families will be recognised at a public ceremony on 24 September during Farm Science Review, followed by a private luncheon. Each receives a $400 award from the Ohio Farm Bureau Federation.

Source: Farm Progress