By Laura Hardie, Red Barn Writer
On Guy Crosby’s beef farm in Hartland, farming runs in cycles. Nutrients move through soil, grass, and animals and return to the land.
Plastic disrupts that cycle.
Like many livestock producers, Crosby relies on bale wrap to preserve hay and adapt to unpredictable weather. Wrapped in airtight plastic, still-wet hay can ferment without days of drying. It’s a big advantage in Vermont’s rainier seasons. But once removed, the plastic has few responsible disposal options. Recycling systems are not yet developed, landfilling is costly, and farmers worry about microplastics and water quality.
“We had one guy in Lyndon that stored his plastic for four years in a corner of his barn,” Crosby said of a farmer who couldn’t bear to put plastic in a landfill. “He was very happy when we came along.”
In 2024, the Connecticut River Watershed Farmers Alliance (CRWFA) launched a farmer-led agricultural plastics recycling pilot, funded by a Working Lands Enterprise Initiative grant, to test whether bale wrap can be collected, stored, compacted, and transported for recycling. Bale wrap was selected specifically for its recyclability; it is typically cleaner and drier, and its physical properties make it of interest to recyclers.
To date, 25 farms are actively participating, with more than 40 expressing interest. Over 14 tons of bale wrap have been collected, with the project on track to reach about 20 tons. The pilot confirmed strong farmer demand for recycling and municipal interest in keeping plastic out of landfills—but also highlighted missing infrastructure.
As the pilot has progressed, several challenges have become clear. First, the plastic needs to be kept clean and dry. Second, municipal waste districts are not set up to handle the end-to-end process of collecting, baling, storing, and marketing agricultural plastics.
None of the transfer stations with balers, in Lyndonville and Brattleboro, Vermont, or Lebanon, New Hampshire, has space to hold loose or baled wrap until enough accumulates for shipment. Crosby has taken on much of the legwork, logging more than 3,000 miles to collect plastic, transport it for baling at the waste district sites, and then store the 16 bales they’ve made so far, weighing up to 2,000 pounds each, at his farm.
“We are doing one part,” said CRWFA Executive Director Michael Snow. “We’d like municipal waste districts to be consistently committed to compacting the plastic for us in different parts of our watershed.”
Inconsistency and a scarcity of markets have also challenged the pilot program. When the project began, EFS-Plastics of Pennsylvania was set to process and market the bale wrap. Midway through the pilot, they withdrew due to marketing challenges. CRWFA has since contacted another company that may recycle the material, though costs are pending, and submitted a letter of support to a Massachusetts facility that might open later in 2026. In the meantime, they are continuing to make bales, as recyclers require an 18- to 20-ton trailer load.
One thing is clear: As landfills reach capacity, disposal costs rise, and the environmental impacts of plastic become better known, farmers remain adamant about keeping it out of the waste stream despite the logistical challenges.
“Once plastic leaves the farm, it’s not gone,” Crosby said. “It can get back to our farmland eventually…whether it affects the deer and the cattle grazing or the water supply. It matters to figure out how to contain it.”
