Overview

Richard (Dick) and his wife, Kim, co-own the Cates Family Farm LLC in Wyoming Township, Iowa County, with their son Eric and his wife, Kiley, and their daughter Shannon and her husband, Dan. Dick is a life-long farmer who grew up working on his family's beef cow-calf farm, a neighbor's dairy farm, Montana ranches, and in large-scale dairy forage and grain crop production overseas. Dick pursued professional studies in soil science and agronomy and earned an MS (1979) in soils from Montana State University and a PhD (1983) in soils and plant health from the University of Wisconsin-Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences while serving a Leopold Fellowship. Dick began taking over the family farm management in 1987 and then, along with Kim, purchased a portion of the land to build their own farming business. For the next eight years, Dick helped (part time) lead the development and oversight of the Wisconsin Sustainable Agriculture Program, an on-farm demonstration and research effort of the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection with the purpose of reducing agriculture's dependence on non-renewable petroleum-based inputs. In 1995 Dick was given the opportunity (part time) to develop and direct the Wisconsin School for Beginning Dairy and Livestock Farmers, a program at UW-Madison to train new would-be farmers in business planning and managed grazing. Dick retired from this work in 2018, but over those twenty-three years, he also developed and taught courses within the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences there. Dick and his family are members of the Iowa County Uplands Farmer-Led Watershed Project and the Lowery Creek Watershed Initiative, where they share information about and demonstrate conservation practices with other landowners and the public. Dick authored the book Voices from the Heart of the Land: Rural Stories That Inspire Community (University of Wisconsin Press, 2008) and a children's book, An Adventure on Sterna's Hill (2019). Dick and Kim enjoy walking on the farm and in wild country anywhere, canoeing, skiing, and dancing together. They have four grandchildren who are the love and joy of their lives.

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9781955656771

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Reviews

""For four generations (and counting), Dick Cates and his family have cared for their piece of Wisconsin land with-literally-an abiding love. This story of the Cates farm inspires us to know and honor our own connections with the land and with one another."" -Curt Meine, senior fellow of the Aldo Leopold Foundation and Center for Humans and Nature; author of Aldo Leopold: His Life and Work and The Driftless Reader ""This book is a joy to read. Dick Cates is a wonderful storyteller. He describes his book this way: 'This is a book of stories of the land and the people, stories of my family, and my own story. They are true, and they are full of joy, pain, and reverence for this land, as well as love.' He makes an excellent point in this book-the land has inherent value, and we must all work toward creating a lasting land ethic."" -Jerry Apps, author of Farms and Rural Communities: An Agricultural Ethic for the Future ""Dick Cates writes with a generous and curious heart rooted in science and wonder. He gives voice to generations of water and rock, persons and plants that became his beloved farm. This story is as much about our planet as it is about one extraordinary place in Wisconsin's Driftless region. It was also here where I forged a life in food. Working with the Cates family taught me that 'local' is a dimension as much as it is a distance. Dick dives deep into the layered complexities of his life in family farming and food and hears a chorus. If you're curious about how smallholder farming holds solutions not only for soil but for society, read this book."" -Odessa Piper, founder of L'Etoile, Madison, Wisconsin's first farm-to-table restaurant; founder of LLC OrganicArts for community-focused cooking ""From the natural forces that shaped it to the First Peoples who cherished it to the Cates family that continues to steward it, A Creek Flows Through This Driftless Area is an intimate story about a farm family and their loving relationship to the land. I highly recommended reading."" -Patty Loew, citizen of Mashkiiziibii (River Band of Lake Superior Ojibwe); author of Indian Nations of Wisconsin: Histories of Endurance and Renewal ""The generosity and spirit of the Cates family providing a public easement on their farm for public access to Lowery Creek, a Class 1 trout stream, is one more example of how the family is a role model to the rest of us for so many good causes."" -Kathleen Falk, Wisconsin Conservation Hall of Fame 2022 inductee

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