Minnesota farmers grazed sheep under solar panels; flock covered 6,500 acres

In 2017, Arlo Hark and Josie Trople founded Cannon Valley Graziers in Northfield, Minnesota, as a dedicated solar grazing operation. According to the North American Agrivoltaics Awards, the business has now grazed more than 6,500 acres of solar farms for developers, operators and owners.

Its flock rotates across dozens of sites each season in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa, with further sites in the western and central United States. The company offers Solar Grazing, Vegetation Management and Forestry Restoration, and has two sister ventures, Tethera and Bayl. The pair have been named the 2026 Solar Ranchers of the Year.

How Minnesota farmers started solar grazing

Arlo and Josie founded Cannon Valley Graziers in Northfield, Minnesota, in 2017.

It describes the business as a dedicated solar grazing operation that has now grazed more than 6,500 acres of solar farms for developers, operators and owners.The business started in the upper Midwest. Cannon Valley Graziers now rotates its flock across dozens of sites each season in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa, and also grazes solar farms further afield in the western and central United States.

How grazing-based vegetation management works

The company's work now spans three service lines: Solar Grazing, Vegetation Management and Forestry Restoration.

It describes Arlo and Josie as experts with applied experience in the field, who have combined these services into a single offering of grazing-based vegetation management.This approach costs less than mowing. It also builds soil health and biodiversity rather than simply suppressing growth, and it keeps working land working with natural systems. The citation says this operating model has earned Cannon Valley Graziers coverage from Bloomberg, Minnesota Public Radio and other media.

How the couple expanded the business

Arlo holds a board seat at the American Solar Grazing Association. It says he shares leadership responsibilities with other board members and passes on the field-tested lessons that he and Josie have learned over the nearly ten years of building the business, which the citation says now has a footprint across the country.The couple have launched two sister ventures: Tethera, which focuses on meat, and Bayl, which focuses on renewable fibre. Both turn the flock's vegetation-management work into finished products, so that the business draws on food, renewable fibre and fashion, and grazing. Arlo and Josie, as younger farmers with a young family, say their experience shows that solar grazing can give the next generation of agricultural producers access to working land.

It names land access as a problem that prevents many would-be farmers and ranchers from getting started.