I caught up with a friend last week who owned a large dairy farm and now works for a farm co-op in his “retirement.” When I mentioned ag-safety programs and OSHA compliance, he quickly rolled his eyes and sarcastically said, “Ugh,” with a chuckle.

As the dedicated safety leader for your farm, you probably know OSHA's core safety-compliance standards quite thoroughly. As you understand all too well, knowing the core farm-safety standards is an ongoing—never-ending, actually—practice, and it is essential that you and your fellow safety-team members monitor and adhere to OSHA's most current regulations specific to agriculture. It is better to keep up with OSHA training requirements and overall safety standards than to have to meet an OSHA safety inspector face-to-face after an incident.

When you and your harvest crew gear up for fall harvest, we hope you first follow our tips on how to prep your farm for this season. After you have, take a look at these common combine hazards, so you're as safe as possible on the job.

Although we believe that farm safety should be practiced every single day that you are on the job, it’s even more exciting when a whole week is dedicated to celebrating and encouraging safety in agriculture.

While summer is coming to an end, most of us are gearing up for a long harvest season. Regardless of what you grow­—corn, wheat, silage, beans, you name it—it’s the busiest and most labor-intensive time of the year.  

You work tirelessly researching and studying OSHA's regulations and various training requirements to keep your farm safe. You study the Bradley Curve, and try to find ways to lower your farm's DART rating. And nobody knows better than you about how to find fantastic information about creating and fostering a safety culture in the workplace.

Tractors are essential to your farm operation, because without them you and your employees wouldn’t be able to do your jobs. Heck, most of you reading this probably learned to drive a tractor before you learned to drive a car. But what about your employees' tractor skills?

Summer is a busy time for farm operations and their employees. As the days get longer and hotter, it’s important to keep your farm family safe.

Every farm needs an ag-safety program that complies with OSHA regulations, and your boss selected you to lead the project. You are definitely up for this new challenge. Although you know how important safety and health are to the longevity and success of the farm, you see just one, small problem—you don’t have time to become an OSHA expert.

With so few official OSHA training regulations for agriculture, you might think that you have covered all your bases in your farm-safety training and meeting OSHA's training requirements. On the contrary, staying current on all OSHA requirements is an ongoing project for you and your safety team.

Safety issues must become a top priority. That means creating a strategy that safeguards your employees’ and managers’ safety and fosters a solid expectation for everyone’s complete compliance with OSHA guidelines. These goals will help establish the foundation of a safety culture that, in turn, could lead to higher productivity and profits for your farm.