Illinois Family Farms

[agstar77]

Bankruptcy filed for 30000 acre operation. What goes around comes around.

[cottonpicken]

Who are they and what do you mean by comes
around?

[freewheat]

Sheesh, you guys need to follow agtalk.
This is old news. Basically, one of those
farmer of the year types that magazines
praises incessantly, was running an
externally amazing farm. Internally, not
so much. That is the brief run down.

[SASKFARMER3]

Ag star this is old news.

[fjlip]

Another "large efficient" operation for RB auctions to pick the bones of.

[sumdumguy]

Its very hard to manage these huge operations.
Its fine if everything goes your way, but farming
isn't like that. Russian Roulette can be a killer.

[freewheat]

You hit it. It is tough to manage
anything if things don't line up and you
have some amount of luck.I just find it
a bit humourous that these model farms
are so often not so model when you strip
away the covers. I know a guy who farmed
16 000 acres, had it made, everyone
thought all was peachy, "owned" 4
combines etc. Auction sale came, he
owned diddly, everything was a facade.

My point? There has to be a happy
medium, and there are so many ways to
farm and do well or poorly. It is not
like we have climate controlled
factories and we are all producing green
eggs and ham. Espousing one model as the
way of the future is a fickle thing.
None of us know the future. For all we
know farms will get smaller in the
future. Nobody knows. The farm papers
need to start including some of us with
less than 77000 acres once in a while.
Why do they not?

[hobbyfrmr]

Freewheat, just a guy doing his best to be careful,
raising/feeding his family while contributing to his
little community, church, rm, library etc.mdoesnt
make much of a story these days. An under 30
year old building a huge farm enterprise leasing
multiplles of the biggest and best most efficient
farm equipment in north America . Now that's a
story. Usually when I read AG articles, The
document is usually printed by a machinery
company, a grain company, a seed/chemical
company, or a finance company. They are
discreetly highlighting their products and services
, the farmer in the story is just a pawn.
Of course I never figured it out, and I am not
smart enough to compete with the big dogs. I do
enjoy farming and I am generally content but
there nothing at my farm worth writing about.

[furrowtickler]

Good comments, but look at it this way, many out there are much smarter not to compete with these "big dogs". More will drop than will make it. Some will be successfull no doubt, but most are just smoke and mirrors waiting for that fatefull day. Just sit back and pick up the pieces after the train weck, it's a matter of time. It's happened here already as well and will again soon. Sad to watch good operations turn into circus acts b/c cause of greed that builds to a point they can not quit grabbin every thing in sight until they crash. Again seen it first hand before and will again within the next 1-2 years.

[SASKFARMER3]

The shitty spring never ends. Now have
till friday night to buy out another
neighbor who is about 10 miles away from
our yard. Just off phone with him and
told him let the investors have it from,
Yes this time Vancouver!!!!!!!!!!! The
owner is going to farm it back if we
didnt buy it. Yea sell out and farm it
back. Works every time, Again its this
all or nothing BS.
Oh well it now totals 70 Quarters gone
in our farming area. Actually starting
to feel good about all these sales. Hm.

[hobbyfrmr]

SF3, loosen up and write a cheque. You are losing all this land right around you. You will never get to buy it back and soon you will be surrounded by outsiders. It going to be difficult to live there if you dont buy more land and keep everyone out.

[farmaholic]

These guys that are selling out are just taking advantage of an opportunity. If Ag goes south and land prices with it(although I think the bar{land prices} has been set higher by now), they will have missed out on the high prices. Are these guys just about ready to pack it in anyway? SK3, at least this time you were given the option!!!

[SASKFARMER3]

Yea these two were ready, I didn't see it coming,
must be slipping. I have their cleaned seedi in my
bins and not a word till yesterday. Not a joke.
Nothing. Starting to think if you can't beat them
join them. Have relatives west away that would
sell and could relocate. Must be slipping.
But heard a good one from a new Canadian. He
could by his old farm he sold back in the
motherland for 50% of what he got. Hm 8 years.

[grassfarmer]

Who'd want to go back to Zimbabwe though?

[SASKFARMER3]

Sorry grass jolly old not zimbabwae.