Specialty Crop

Specialty crops eligible to be included in 2024 Wyoming Specialty Crop Directory are (1) vegetables; (2) fruits and tree nuts; (3) culinary herbs and spices; (4) medicinal herbs; (5) edible horticultural products, including honey and hops; (6) deciduous flowering trees that produce edible fruit; and (7) deciduous shrubs that produce edible fruit.

Eligible plants must be cultivated or managed and used by people for food and medicinal purposes. Processed products shall consist of greater than 50% of the specialty crop by weight, exclusive of added water. Common examples in the directory are jams, jellies, infused honeys, sauces (e.g., barbecue, hot, and pasta), salsa, pickled vegetables, fermented vegetables (e.g., kimchi and sauerkraut), fruit pies, and wine.

Because this directory is focused on edible specialty crops, it does not include businesses involved in other areas of specialty crop production, such as floriculture and turfgrass.

The directory also does not include agricultural products not defined as ‘specialty crops’ by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). In Wyoming, this would include such commodities as livestock and dairy products, eggs, and agricultural crops such as alfalfa, barley, field corn, hemp, sugar beets, and wheat.

However, the directory DOES LIST non-eligible commodities and non-edible specialty crops if a business produces those in addition to edible specialty crops.

The tables below list plants commonly considered edible specialty crops by the USDA as of August 2024, including vegetables, fruits and tree nuts, culinary herbs and spices, medicinal herbs, edible horticultural crops, deciduous flowering trees that produce edible fruit, and deciduous shrubs that produce edible fruits. The below list comes directly from the USDA website: “What is a Specialty Crop?” Some of the listed vegetables (e.g., melon, pepper, pumpkin, and tomato) are actually fruits. More information is at https://www.ams.usda.gov/services/grants/scbgp/specialty-crop/.

IMPORTANT notes to consider: when choosing which species to plant, do your homework. Will the plant survive (thrive) in your area? To help answer that question, check the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map for Wyoming (see ‘Resources’ section)? Is the plant easy to grow, or fussy (see ‘Resources’)? What kind of soil is preferred, and what about watering, fertilization, and pollination. Seeds come with planting instructions, so carefully read those. Finally, some of the listed herbs can be incredibly invasive, so keep that at the forefront when researching species. The last thing you want is plants that are spreading across your property, and onto the neighbor’s land.