CLEAR LAKE, Iowa — Greg Nicholas laughs at the image he suspects most people have of a hemp farmer. He doesn’t wear tie-died shirts or headbands. He doesn’t sport a beard. There is no Grateful Dead playing in the background.
Iowa farmer goes big with first-year hemp acres
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Greg Nicholas started growing industrial hemp in Iowa in 2020. The dryer he built for it is perhaps the first of its kind.
Many small producers dry hemp by hand, hanging it in the same way tobacco growers would. Nicholas tried that with a bit of his crop, but he knew that would not work for 15 acres worth of hemp. So he built a small bin with a specialized grain drying system.
