Rye may hold the key to saving the San Luis Valley, where drought and climate pressures threaten one of Colorado’s most important agricultural regions. A local initiative is working with government agencies, food brands and consumers to build a market for the grain and build resilience in the valley.
The Rye Resurgence Project is described on its website as “Championing high alpine rye for a sustainable future in the San Luis Valley.”
Why rye?
“It checks all the boxes,” project cofounder Sarah Jones said. “It’s more nutritious, more delicious and you’re literally saving the planet because it uses so much less water.” Growing rye requires only about 12 inches of water a year, compared to 18-26 inches for crops like barley and alfalfa.
Rye’s low water needs are the key. Colorado is the second-largest producer of potatoes in the country and 92% of the crop is grown in the San Luis Valley, but decades of drought have depleted the region’s underground aquifers and created Dust Bowl conditions. “The valley’s agriculture economy contributes $481 million a year” to the state, said project cofounder Heather Dutton, who also manages the San Luis Valley Water Conservancy District. Without new economic and environmental pathways, the industry and community are at risk.
The project promotes rye as a sustainable crop that uses less water, prevents soil erosion and provides farmers with a new product to sell. Jones and Dutton have forged partnerships that link urban consumers with rural producers, including a collaboration with Little Man Ice Cream through Denver’s Climate Project.
“We may be in the city, but we rely on our rural communities,” said Elizabeth Babcock, executive director of Denver’s Office of Climate Action. “This partnership brings together a Denver business and Colorado farmers, with proceeds from each ice cream sale returning to support regenerative agriculture in the San Luis Valley.”
The Rye Resurgence project, launched with a grant from the Colorado Water Conservation Board, now works with eight farmers in the valley to grow rye and help find buyers for it. “Farmers are ready and willing to grow crops like rye,” Jones says.
“The most important people right now are our existing customers,” Jones says. The project has built relationships with companies in other communities, like Moxie Bread Co., millers Dry Storage and Roaring Fork Mill, and Dryland Distillery to get more rye into products and in front of consumers. “When we change what we buy, farmers will change what they grow. They’re ready and willing … they just need the demand.”
Public efforts like the Denver Climate Project are working to build that demand. Designed to drive behavior change and increase the visibility of climate action in the community, “The Denver project was developed as a way to meet people where they’re at and create an entry point for engaging on climate action,” Babcock says.
Campaigns like the one with Little Man Ice Cream help drive demand for rye and shift consumer perceptions of the grain.
“If I had a billboard, it would say: Rye does not taste like caraway seeds,” Jones said. “Rye can be used in anything you’re baking at home.”
Addressing climate change requires networks of producers, businesses, consumers, and policymakers working together. By turning that effort into something as enjoyable as eating ice cream, initiatives like Rye Resurgence and the Denver Climate Project show how climate action is accessible to everyday people, and through their purchases, they can strengthen farms, communities, and the economy.
Little Man’s Not Today Apocalicks flavor, featuring rye-shortbread cookies embedded in a tangy orange ice cream, will be scooped to benefit the Rye Resurgence Project while supplies last at Little Man stores, Sweet Cooie’s in Denver and Old Town Churn in Fort Collins