Lucy Gowdy

Dear Committee Members My husband and I own and operate a dairy farm in Walpole. We chose to buy and start a farm in NH about 30 years ago. We ship our milk to Stonyfield Yogurt, and In the last 5 years we have received two of the Cheshire County Conservation Climate Resiliency Grants. The first was to purchase soil amendments to assist us in providing a solid nutrient management plan for crops that seem to struggle lately, with the ever changing climate.. Last year we were also awarded a Climate Resiliency Grant, and I can say that this opportunity allowed us to upgrade the equipment in our milking house. We actually received a NE-DBIC grant from the USDA because we had also applied for the Climate Resiliency Grant through the Cheshire County Conservation District. Between the two awards we were able to upgrade the bulk tank that we store milk in, we were able to purchase a variable speed vacuum pump, a new energy efficient hot water heater, and with the CCCD monies we were also able to purchase a Fre Heater, which utilizes energy from the milk system to pre-heat water going into the hot water system. All of these improvements were done to help reduce our energy usage, I have only been able to compare a couple of months worth of our energy bills, but I can tell you that we have lowered our energy usage in our dairy. We would not have been able to accomplish this without the funding from the Conservation District. These grants are specific to be used for Soil Health, Energy, Water Management, or Crop and Livestock Protection, I am sure that these grant funds have been used to help increase profitability and efficiency for other farm businesses across the state of New Hampshire. Please support this legislation, it is an investment in the future of NH Agriculture. Thank you very much Lucy and Christian Gowdy Brookfield Farm Walpole NH