by Ireland Hayes | Jun 2, 2026 | Agriculture, Sidebar, Top Story
Hay crops down average 50% ‘Everything is dependent on water’ Tom Massie stands on a hilltop near Massies Corner, taking in a portion of his 150 acres of rolling hayfields as a misty rain falls around him, soaking into what was, before this week, bone-dry soil. He...
by Bob Hurley | May 25, 2026 | Agriculture, People, Sidebar, Top Story
She knew nothing about cattle farming. Then she changed it. Monira Rifaat never expected to become a cattle farmer. Trained as a pathologist under the British medical system in Egypt where she was born in 1938, she arrived in the United States in the 1960s, completed...
by Tim Carrington | May 19, 2026 | Agriculture, Environment, Real Estate, Sidebar, Top Story
Fate of Waterpenny Farm, Sperryville River Trail in question The unwinding of the Clifford Miller III family’s vast Sperryville landholdings and partnerships accelerated last weekend when a local couple, Pat Snyder and Bob Kramer, signed a contract to buy 17 acres...
by Ireland Hayes | May 4, 2026 | Agriculture, Environment, Sidebar, Top Story
‘Pretty much a total loss’ As Bill Gadino walked through his vineyard at Gadino Cellars in Washington, he stopped several times last Friday to pick dried, withering leaves off grapevines. “These had all emerged,” he said, examining the nubs left where fresh...
by Tim Carrington | May 4, 2026 | Business, Features, Real Estate, Sidebar, Top Story
Residents and local groups weigh uncertainty as longtime land arrangements are revisited For nearly two centuries, the Miller family has been Sperryville’s dominant landowner, farming and stewarding 845 acres of Rappahannock countryside while quietly supporting the...
