Working for Wildlife Habitat Hero: At Ease Orchard by Sophia Sorboro, Pollinator Partnership

June 2, 2025

As part of Pollinator Partnership’s Working for Wildlife series, we have interviewed and are sharing the experiences of agricultural producers who have successfully undertaken projects that benefit pollinators and other wildlife with the help of technical and/or financial support through conservation provisions of the USDA’s Farm Bill. We hope their stories encourage and empower readers (including you!) and help foster a better understanding of the programs available to help support thriving food and ecosystems that we all rely upon!

In this installment, it is our privilege to feature Habitat Hero Joe Ricker of At Ease Orchard. We invite you to join us in learning about At Ease Orchard’s habitat journey in the interview below. You can also watch the accompanying video featuring the story of this inspiring Habitat Hero below:

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Tell us about your farm

Joe: My name is Joe Ricker and the farm is called At Ease Orchard. We're located just south of Anderson, Indiana in Wilkinson. We have about 10 acres here, behind me. We have 14 goats (with a couple more of them on the way), raspberries, about 250 apple trees, honey bees, and about 50 chickens.

Our mission is to help people; veterans and first responders particularly, to learn about agriculture and some of the opportunities that both NRCS and USDA can provide, such as our NRCS high tunnel and pollinator plot. We’re also in the process of developing a grazing management plan with support from NRCS, which will help us improve our goat operation. Throughout the farm, we have a multitude of options for veterans to learn about and experience different aspects of small-scale agriculture. It's about teaching veterans how to become farmers and helping them on that journey. So really, instead of being a production farm, what I like to say is we produce veteran farmers!

How long have you been farming and why did you want to become a farmer?

Joe: We bought the property in July of 2016. I had no background in farming prior to that. We lived on the property for a couple years, but didn’t really start farming until after I retired from the army in June of 2022. For me, it’s an opportunity to have veterans relax, enjoy, and get an understanding of how farming is both a great producer of communities and farmers markets. That’s why the name of the place is At Ease. I want them to be able to put themselves at ease here. Farms can be a business to make money but can also be a relaxing environment for people. In my case, veterans.

Why is this operation important to you?

Joe: I feel it's important because the service has provided me certain benefits. Now that I’ve retired, I really want to take some of the skills that I've learned in the military and pass them on to other veterans, as well as some of the skills I'm learning with farming. I want to teach other veterans how to farm and give them little sample opportunities to see if it's right for them.

Like the goats, we will probably give the newborn goats out to some of the veteran beginning farmers that we work with so they can have an opportunity to have goats. Also, we get chickens from Purdue 4-H, and we give some of them to veterans so they can try chickens. It's a hard business to get into when you go full business scale. It's easier to try to do small things and see if you like it, especially when you're a veteran that maybe has never done it before and has been in the service for the past twenty years. It's really a new thing, and you're not a spring chicken anymore after service!

Since you started farming, what differences have you observed in farming practices or food access in the community?

Joe: You know, that's a great question. I used to wonder what happened to excess produce. Now that I’m a farmer, I've really gotten into no food waste practices. There's always a family out there that can use the food. There are food pantries out there that can use the food.

When we got the chickens from Purdue, we took the roosters, culled them, and donated the meat to the local food pantry. We've taken produce and given it to the American Legion and the food pantry. I really think with the effort you put into farming, you realize everybody appreciates good healthy food.

What first made you interested in pollinator conservation?

Joe: I don't know if you can see the honey bees flying around me, but honey bees were kind of my first passion. When I was in the service there were a lot of people that reared honey bees. After getting involved in beekeeping, interest in pollinators as a whole became a natural progression for me. I got the pollinator habitat started in 2020 with help from NRCS. At first, I found it difficult to grow native plants. But then my wife really got into it with stratification, and local plants, and going to other native plant sales.

Native plants are really cool and they're definitely needed for pollination and for the bees and everything else.

What pollinator-friendly or other conservation practices have you implemented on your land?

Joe: In 2020 we established the pollinator plot. We did an acre there. We did a little strip row behind me as well, and then we also used the EQIP program to install a high tunnel with help from NRCS. We also are looking at a great opportunity to get assistance in adopting a grazing plan in the future and considering the CSP program as well.

Have you noticed a positive impact to pollinators and other wildlife?

Joe: Yes. I think everybody starts off thinking that honey bees are a great local pollinator that needs help, but they're actually not native to the area. They were brought in from Europe., but we have actually seen more native bees in the areas where we installed pollinator-supporting conservation practices. It’s really cool to see the ground bees and the other bees that are around. Not just that, but monarch butterflies as well are great to see! Disappointing sometimes when they aren't seen, but we love seeing monarch butterflies as well.

What other types of changes, positive outcomes, or benefits have you seen after implementing your practices?

Joe: I can name at least two!

One, it's really cool when our honey bees collect pollen and nectar from different plants. What they pollinate and forage from impacts the flavor of the honey. We've had some unique flavors on the honey based on which trees, cover crops, or the pollination area they visited.

I would also say that the native grasses have increased our soil health quite a bit. Where you can really tell is in the ditch that runs through our pollinator plot over on the far side. You can see the long roots of the grasses and other stuff in the planting are really helping to prevent the erosion on the ditch.

Describe how your farm benefitted from USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), Soil and Water Conservation District (SWCD), and/or other programs and how did you first learn about this support? If applicable, which type of NRCS Programs did you choose to work with?

Joe: Besides the high tunnel through the EQIP program and the pollinator habitat plot I’ve already talked about; we’re also considering working with NRCS through their Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP). With technical and financial assistance opportunities through CSP, we're thinking about adding some cover crops under the apple trees to try to prevent some of the invasive weeds. We've also considered adding irrigation systems, some practices that incorporate trees for wind protection, and maybe rain gardens for some of the drainage areas.

In addition to being a farmer, I'm also a master gardener. I got that certification through Purdue Extension, and it was paid for by a program for veterans called AgVets, through Hoosier Uplands.

Engaging with Purdue’s Master Gardener program has given us the opportunity to expand our impact and get other veterans on the farm. Even if they aren’t necessarily interested in farming, they can come and help out as a master gardener. Just today, we had two master gardeners volunteering on the farm as a result of that partnership. So, connection with the community has been very valuable in a lot of different areas.

From your experience, what would you say other landowners can expect when working with NRCS, SWCDs, or other programs?

Joe: They're very welcoming. We worked with Lais McCarty at Purdue Extension. She's awesome and she pulls you in and gives you all the information. I've gotten a lot of connections with veterans through her as well. A lot of Soil and Water Conservation Districts are very open and NRCS is always available for information. It's just a welcoming community trying to get people into local agriculture.

What is something you wish you knew before going through this process, especially in terms of habitat establishment and long-term management?

Joe: I wish I had known more about pollinators before I did my pollinator habitat. I just dove into it as an opportunity for the bees and other stuff, but I probably did not plant it as well as I could. I probably could have had a more productive year for it after sowing the seed. So, I wish I was kind of just a little bit smarter in how I did that rather than the newbie doing a pollinator planting before I was really ready.

I would also say I think it's very valuable when you do these practices to go to the professionals before you do them and knowing what everybody's role is and what they can help you with. You know, NRCS is really the funding and the conservation assistance. Purdue extension really can get you into the technical expertise of how to do it. So, knowing the community and being more embedded in the opportunities there from the start would've probably made it easier on me.

What is some advice you would give to others interested in implementing pollinator friendly conservation practices on their land?

Joe: I would say if you want to support pollinators, make sure you do the research. Have a good reason for it. Just don't do it because you can get free seed. Do it because you want to create a pollinator plot. NRCS’s financial assistance helps, but doesn't cover everything. You should do the practice not just because you can get something for free, but because you are interested in it and it is important to you.

What is your favorite pollinator or wildlife species?

I would say easily the monarch butterfly. They are really cool. We've really enjoy seeing the little eggs being laid and then the caterpillar and then the butterflies themselves off milkweeds. It's really cool to see all of this and the monarch butterflies are kind of our favorite.

Thank you for joining us in reading this installment of Pollinator Partnership’s Working for Wildlife blog and special thanks to Joe Ricker of At Ease Orchard for sharing his Habitat Hero story! Watch the Habitat Hero video featuring At Ease Orchard.

This video series is made possible through funding and support from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation and the USDA’s National Resources Conservation Service. The USDA is an equal opportunity provider, employer, and lender.  

To ensure you never miss a new video, be sure to subscribe to the Working for Wildlife series at: tinyurl.com/mpjszd7k  

We encourage you to check out the links below to learn more about At Ease Orchard:

To learn more about financial and technical assistance available to famers and landowners visit: pollinator.org/nrcs-regional-partner-biologists or farmers.gov  

This video series was created by Pollinator Partnership (P2). To learn more about P2’s mission and how you can help conserve pollinators, please visit the links below: