Ben and Kayla Dilworth Win DCA's Malone Award for Farm Conservation
Ben and Kayla Dilworth of Denton, Md. have earned Delmarva Chicken Association's 2025 George ‘Bud' Malone Environmental Award. The Dilworths, who raise chickens in partnership with Mountaire Farms, are the fourth recipients of DCA's award for outstanding on-farm conservation and environmental design. The Dilworths received a plaque and a $500 prize, and their Beyla Farm operation will be nominated for USPOULTRY's Family Farm Environmental Excellence Award.
The Dilworths operate their six-house farm with cleanliness top of mind. They leave room in this vision of the farm for wilderness - there are fish stocked in a stormwater pond, bee boxes behind the manure shed, and plots of sunflowers and other pollinator-friendly plants as well. But overall, if they have a chance to make the farm a little tidier by the end of the day, they'll take it.
"I don't like manure in the stones and I don't like manure on the pads," Kayla Dilworth said. "We clean them as soon as the chickens are gone - they get scraped, they get swept and they get shoveled. We have had some people that have come and said they've never seen a farm this clean, and that makes us feel good, too."
Beyla Farm has natural forested buffers on two sides and is bordered by organic crop fields. Their farm road is lined with tree buffers, and two ponds on the property have a variety of pollinator-friendly trees and shrubs. Ben and Kayla have added large rectangular plots of sunflowers, radishes and other bee-friendly plantings that don't require mowing. They planted giant Miscanthus, a quick-growing and extremely sturdy tall grass, in rows opposite their tunnel fans, planning for the grass to capture any dust or feathers.
The farm also features ground-based solar energy. Stormwater features were built with forebays to filter sediment during drainage. Ben Dilworth noted he's choosing some on-farm plantings, including switchgrass, that are friendly to bobwhite quail, rowing in tandem with Maryland wildlife management agencies that are trying to increase quail habitat across the state.
"It makes us feel good that we're doing a good job, trying to be good stewards of the land," Ben Dilworth said. "We try and add something every year."
The award's namesake, Bud Malone, had the foresight to begin DCA's nationally recognized vegetative environmental buffers program and continues to help the chicken community to this day. This program has resulted in the planting of thousands of trees, shrubs and grasses on family-owned poultry farms on Delmarva and led to improved relations between farm owners and neighboring property owners.
This award shines a spotlight on Delmarva chicken growers who integrate vegetative environmental buffers and other conservation measures, ensuring their farms are sustainable and are good neighbors.
- Practices considered by DCA's Grower Committee in selecting a winning farm include:
- Heavy use pads, well-maintained and well-kept
- Vegetative environmental buffers around chicken houses; at property lines; and around ponds and manure sheds
- Pollinator-friendly vegetative buffer plots
- Overall cleanliness
- Grass buffers near tunnel fans to contain dust, feathers, and odor
- Solar energy on the farm
- Excellent mortality composting practices
- Commendable appearance and maintenance of manure storage structures
- Well-maintained farm roads
- Weed control around chicken houses
- Proper drainage, including stormwater ponds
- Other adaptations or practices the grower has made to benefit neighbor relations
Ben and Kayla Dilworth of Denton, Md.
About Delmarva Chicken Association
Delmarva Chicken Association, founded in 1948, is the Delmarva chicken industry's voice as the premier membership association focusing on advocacy, education and member relations. DCA's vision is to be the most-respected chicken organization in the United States. For more information about the Delmarva Chicken Association, visit www.dcachicken.com or call 302-856-9037.