Agricultural Extension Offices

I love going to different agricultural extension offices’ web sites. They are wonderful gems of information on how to shop, prepare foods, create budgets, and live frugally. This is a link to the USDA website with links to all 50 states’ agricultural extension offices.

http://www.csrees.usda.gov/Extension/

One of my favorite extension web sites is for the state of Michigan. Their Furthering Families web site has basic information on weathering financial storms (as well as what to do if you have a Bovine TB positive animal!) http://www.fcs.msue.msu.edu/ff/financialmanagement.html . They also have a Financial Matters web site that gives good budgeting information as well as other good financial information. http://www.fm.fcs.msue.msu.edu/

The Maryland extension web site is not as large as Michigan’s. Here is a link to the publications that you can get from them on family and financial issues:

http://extension.umd.edu/publications/Category.cfm?ID=A

The Cecil web site does advertise a few classes that are being given and also gives you a name of who to contact. You can probably contact the agent to be put on a notify list. But, all in all, I don’t think Maryland has much going for their web site.

Delaware has a great web site and produces a newsletter called “Two Cent Tips for Delaware”. Notice the left hand side of the page has different personal financial issues that you can click on and get great information. They also have links to some federal government resources.

Delaware’s Ag extension gives classes on money management topics. I see the flyers in the main branch of the Cecil Public Library. Here is a link to the New Castle County monthly calendar:

http://ag.udel.edu/WebCalendar/month.php?user=_NUC_NCC_Extension

Pennsylvania has a nice web site too. Here is a link to their family financial planning and consumer affairs publications web site: http://pubs.cas.psu.edu/PubSubject.asp?varSubject=Family%20Financial%20Planning%20and%20Consumer%20Affairs

They have a multi-part series on what to do if your income drops. With 10.2% unemployment, this could come in handy. Each county in Pennsylvania has its own web site I urge you to explore different counties’ web sites under the Families and Children area (on the left side of the screen click on this topic). A wealth of information is available!

In addition to financial planning issues, the web sites contain a huge amount of information on canning and preserving, which is a great frugal activity. If you are planting a garden you can get gardening advice here too. I planted my first garden this year and these web sites will be invaluable for planning next year’s garden!