June 2024 Speaker Series: Regenerative and Locally-Adapted Grains in Wyoming and Beyond

Sara Wood is the owner and founder of Wyoming Heritage Grains in Powell Wyoming, Sara believes that keeping food in her community and connecting people to where their food comes from and how it gets to their plate is of utmost importance. Sara’s operation is the only commercial flour mill in Wyoming. She sells White Sonora pancake mix, red fife berries, several types of fresh-milled flours and much more. Her family first arrived to the Big Horn Basin in northwestern Wyoming in the early 1900s and has farmed on their current property since 1946. In 2017, she became curious about why more people are gluten intolerant and discovered heritage and heirloom grains as an alternative option. Sara left her corporate job and convinced her father and uncle to completely transform their traditional farm, growing conventional crops like sugar beets, corn and beans, into a regenerative agricultural operation. They use several species of cover crops and companion crops, rotational grazing and no till practices to raise their heritage wheats, barleys, and rye.
Hana Fancher lives in Laramie, Wyoming, where she works in agricultural economics, focusing on perennial crop development. Hana spent part of her childhood working on her family’s sixth-generation cow-calf operation in southeast Wyoming, which instilled a passion and appreciation for agriculture. After completing her undergraduate degree, Hana continued to pursue her passion for ranching by working for ranches in Colorado, New Mexico, and Hawaii. She served as the foreman at San Juan Land and Livestock in Colorado’s San Luis Valley, where she became involved with the San Luis Valley Chapter of Rocky Mountain Farmers Union. After returning home to her family’s ranch, Hana served as the Wyoming Membership Coordinator for the Rocky Mountain Farmers Union.
Tessa Peters grew up in Northeastern Wyoming, on the edge of the Black Hills. Ponderosa pines and sagebrush dominate her imagination of home. She directs the Crop Stewardship Program at The Land Institute where she works to understand the forces that influence agricultural transformation from conception to consumption of perennial grain crops. She works remotely from Laramie where she lives, backpacks, reads, and creates art with her kids and husband. She has a Bachelor of Science Degree in Physics from CSU, a Bachelor of Science Degree in Agroecology from UW, and a PhD in Plant Breeding and Plant Genetics from UW-Madison.