Let’s talk farming again.

[Sheepwheat]

Just wanted to ask what your farm future looks like? I don’t want this to be depressing. It’s a tough topic. But maybe there will come some practical applications.

Do you have kids coming into the business? Will your farm stay in the family for the foreseeable future? What is the plan if not? Sell or rent out? Mentor a young couple? Try to find a non farmer who may want to try a new idea?

I’ll go first. I currently am not sure any of my kids will for sure farm. At least not in the traditional sense.

Son number one loves his chickens and bees. He can run all machinery on the farm, loves combining etc. Not fond of the sheep at this point though.

Daughter number one. Loves animals, loves the sheep, is naturally very good with them. Loses her temper though at times. ( who doesn’t?) I can see her running sheep someday.

Daughter two. She raises the turkeys and enjoys it. Loves the sheep as well. Not sure if she has the natural knack of daughter no. one.

Son two. He raises the pigs. Still young enough to need to be told to feed and water them more consistently. He’s young and has so far not shown a lot of signs of farming interest in a serious way.

So I don’t know yet as our kids are not very old really. Lots of time for them to nail down goals and dreams and whether they want to give farming a try. I will not stand in their way. If none farm, I would rent out land to an unsuspecting farmer. If things were lined up properly, I would love to help someone out to get their feet planted in agriculture, someone who doesn’t necessarily farm, but could bring new and fresh ideas to replenish and refill this land that is emptying out more and more every year. It would be made easier if a couple wanted to raise small acreage high value crops. It would be cool to find a few ppl who each wanted to rent 40 -50 acres to raise garlic or whatever. How do you find these people? For us, we are getting a lot of contacts through our lamb marketing. We might find people that way, through connections we have.

I don’t intend to sell, and I believe my kids feel the same way. They love the bush, the lake, the wildlife. They see it disappearing all around us, and how unique our landscape has become. I believe they will hold onto it and preserve it into the future at this point. With escalating rents, why would one sell?

How about you all? How do things look?

[jazz]

Sheep, if todays kids in farming had to start out the way our parents and grandparents did, the interest would be thinned out pretty fast. A lot of 1500-2500 acre farms have been levered up big time to bring the next generation comfortably into the business.

If the average kid coming into farming was told go buy some land, swing wrenches for 15 yrs on some junk and go from there, they would just say fck it and go work for Trudeau.

So what I am saying is sometimes interest has to be manufactured.

3 girls under 10 here. We dont live on the farm so there is a break in their interest just from that. We were looking at buying a commercial property as a diversification and then willing it to the kids for income. That was before covid so not sure now.

But no up and coming farmers behind me. We plan on keeping the land until our death and then probably just having it sold and then dispersed in our estate.

As an aside, I believe the current generation of kids will need the biggest leg up in history to get ahead of whats coming for them.

[Sheepwheat]

Jazz, you could will it all to ducks! Sorry.

[bucket]

Sad part is if you work off farm to buy land you might as well just work and take retirement.

Land prices are now prohibitive to start with nothing. Even good old equipment costs are escalating to where the younger guys are hooped.

Fuel and input costs , then the mortgage and still working ...Keep the job work hard and retire ...Farming is only for 4th and 5th generations now.

And sadly those are the guys that represent us , get the ear of government and then let everyone down...

Disaster hits like this drought and there are no programs these guys were sent to fix or shape...while they lick their lips to buy some more guys out.

Not a conspiracy..the guys representing you are not representing your interests ...they are promoting theirs and only theirs.

[Sheepwheat]

You guys. Do you think there is only the one way to farm? Because in my view, that attitude is holding us back. Gotta think outside the box. What I have found through our marketing of lamb, is there are tons of small scale farmers doing bizarre and different things out there.

Cookie cutter ag isn’t working, is it? If it was working, farms would still be small, because no one would leave due to profitability!

A neighbor seeds ten acres of garlic. Makes a living. Sells the product for what he wants for a price. Doesn’t need hardly any machinery. We need to encourage these guys, not talk about how it’s impossible to start farming, because the only type of farming that can happen is grain. No? Sure if grain farming the impossibility for new blood to enter is real. But what about the bee guys, the value added alpaca fleeces, the pumpkin raising guys?

[jazz]

You guys. Do you think there is only the one way to farm?

Sheep, a lot of people have bad memories of the yrs coming out of the 80s when the message was get diversified or get big or get out. So many people tried exotic livestock and lost their shirts. Look up the new anthrax scare in China.

To me livestock are just more ag and thats not diversification, perhaps just more risk piled on and maybe burning the candle from both ends.

To me, diversification is owning my banks stock. My account pointed that out to me more than a decade ago that if I owned the stocks of the parasites I support (plus some others that have virtual monopolies), thats a better venture than starting a new business on top of the old one. I think he was right.

A dividend landing in your account has to be the nicest money on the planet.

[jamesb]

As someone who started farming full time in 1988, this year brings back lots of memories. I am a amazed with the difference in attitudes we can see in a tough year like this. I am not suggesting to smile through all troubles but I try to have a more long term attitude towards farming and life. With two sons wanting to farm, continued land growth is necessary in my opinion but there are lots of options beyond just farming more land. The opportunities in meat sales as you alluded too are great though we need better butchering capacity here in the west. In my parts all the abattoirs are maxed out in work and are months off in spots for butchering. Diversification beyond just farming is a real help to smooth out problems with one area of farming. One sons involvement in a green house business has been very good as it seems everyone has a renewed interest in flowers, and growing food. I really feel that covid has increased most peoples regard for food security and having a full deep freeze and a bunch of potatoes give people a sense of security.
I look up to my father in his success in growing the farm from his father before him and if I were to examine the differences between his was of doing things and mine , not that one way is right or wrong but maybe one way is/was more appropriate for the time. Where I am going with this is in the past when things got tough my fathers attitude was to work harder and harder to get through the rough patch. Today I guess I try maybe do a better job on the management side than I did when I first started farming. I readily admit that good advice cost good money. Having access to a good accountant, lawyer, market advisor, agronomist had paid dividends for our farm IMO. There is that saying about doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. I have found it tough sometimes to finally acknowledge we were going in the wrong direction in a endeavor and make a change.
One other thing that I have lived by is attitude. In our area we are seeing a high degree of interest of young people getting involved in agriculture these days. We have had quite a period of good times and young people see a good future. I admit I have to try and temper their enthusiasm at times because years like these happen and one has to pull their horns in a little. I remember the 80's where so few saw farming as a opportunity and just a handful of us wanted to farm. I know there is a school of thought that feel the mega farms are the future but for me I am not really that worried about that and feel that there is a place for just about every size of farm keeping in mind of matching ones investment of equipment to the amount of land farmed. Kinda think there is gonna be a little bit of a reset on that front one of these day

[Blaithin]

It’s an unfortunate reality that if someone wants inspiration and guidance in ag ventures, pretty much the last people they should approach are farmers.

Farmers will hide behind the label of pragmatism and experience, but usually it just comes off as bitter, cynical, negative and judgemental. When searching for advice I’ve learned to not approach from the front. I can’t say why I’m interested in something, generally how I want to apply it is too hippy or hobby and instead I’m more likely to receive a lecture on how it will never work. It’s only through general conversation that someone can find the few who have tried similar or are open to whichever idea is in a persons head. Networking is a big and necessary thing.

People cannot just join a forum, as an example, and start a discussion on which plants would be a better option for an in crop cover crop. 98% of the replies wouldn’t answer the question, they would just be various forms of “that won’t work.”

They can’t say they’ve got a plan to live off garlic or pumpkins, what varieties would someone suggest? They won’t receive answers to the question, they’ll be told “the chance of that turning out is slim.”

Cut flowers to improve plant pollination and offer a side income, where would you place the strips and what kind of flowers would be easiest to start? Response would be “why waste good dirt for that”

Thinking of rotating cattle and sheep through some Silvo pasture to help control worm loads and increase diversity but not well versed with sheep breeds. What sort are easy lambing or should I just get weaned lambs? What trees can take the kind of foot traffic I’m thinking? General response would be “Just knock it all down and have straight pasture and pick cows or sheep. No point doing both.”

I know of a number of people “reinventing” their farms either as they move back to the farm from town or that have no farming background to begin with, but they don’t usually venture out of their established network. People don’t need to hear how something else will perform better or generalized “won’t work” comments, they know those views. Branching out of traditional farming means that’s considered and they want to try something else.

I think part of this is the jaded nature of farmers stuck in the endless cycle of payments. Payments for land, inputs, equipment, etc need to be made so they need reliable methods they can trust to get them those payments. They can’t fathom someone not being tied to that cycle the way they are. To them, their advice is helpful, to up and comers it’s highly discouraging.

[jazz]

It’s an unfortunate reality that if someone wants inspiration and guidance in ag ventures, pretty much the last people they should approach are farmers.

All good points Blaithin. I think people need to define their goals. A self sufficient quality lifestyle can be had on a small farm doing the ventures you mention. No doubt about that.

As grain farmers, we are kind of stuck in a riskier side of the business and experiments can be distracting and costly. Organics is the most common example on this side and the stories are abundant. Another is trying to push the growing zones for crops that dont belong here.

[Blaithin]

All good points Blaithin. I think people need to define their goals. A self sufficient quality lifestyle can be had on a small farm doing the ventures you mention. No doubt about that.

As grain farmers, we are kind of stuck in a riskier side of the business and experiments can be distracting and costly. Organics is the most common example on this side and the stories are abundant.

Scale is another issue.

When I talk about playing around with screenings and planting them it’s on a small area. If I were to ask about planting screenings, I believe the default image that pops into a grain farmers mind is an entire field of screenings. On that level, yes, it does seem ridiculous and even I would laugh at the idea.

My fella is a seed farmer. He’s used to thinking of things everywhere from small plot sizes up to sections. He’s much more open to playing with this or that idea because to him an acre or two sized plot is a tool that is regularly used. To most farmers the idea of an acre or two is extra work and rarely even enters their mind.

Our minds do default to what we are comfortable with/to the way we do things. When someone voices an idea, we apply that idea to how we do things. Sometimes they don’t work well together so our initial reaction is that it won’t work.

The challenge is to apply ideas to a more blank canvas than our processes.

[blackpowder]

Takes a lifetime of practice to seek the positives.

40 years ago there were 8 farmers with my surname here. Ten years from now there may be 0. My cousins child had a silver spoon and it isn't in his heart or under his fingernails. All business needs to be taught and imbibed.
I'm rolling a non land owning younger non relative with a great off farm ag career into the corporation.
The business aspect has to be foremost, but the enterprise itself has to be in the heart.
40 years ago the rules of business were never taught. Reaping now what was sown.

[Sheepwheat]

It has to extend as well beyond production of x product. It has to extend to how to market it.

I know for most farmers, it is a very foreign concept to set your own price. Most think marketing is calls, puts, basis contratcs etc.

We can now make a living off of about 200 acres of total land use for the sheep. Not because of how many we produce, but because of our marketing and setting our price. Same with the garlic guy.

We both go to stores and restaurants etc. share samples, and tell them our prices. Some are all in, many or most are not. The key is to get the ones who will buy in, and hold them with superior product, consistent product, and consistent delivery.

The guys who diversified in the last go around are not the same IMO as the are now. Then it was wild and crazy, trying to grab the next best thing, ostriches were hot, ginseng, elk etc. There was ZERO self marketing, except for the breeders. They were still producing a commodity at a price not their own.

The pigeon king, remember him? Ha. He caught up a whole slew of ppl who thought they were diversifying.

Diversifying is not an animal, a plant. It is diversifying your mind. Thinking about producing non commodities. Pricing your product yourself. It can be done. Farmers need to encourage it, not shame those who believe in themselves. Been there done that!

[Sheepwheat]

Sorry, sprinkling here so I have some time. The reason I brought this thread up is because our country side is emptying out. As I look at the farmers around me, while there are several young guys going hard, 90% of them have no wife, no partner, and therefore no kids.

This worries me. What kind of a place will it be in twenty years when three guys farm the RM? That is why I want to encourage from the bottom of my soul, new farmers. I am in an area where historically the farm size was much smaller than other areas, but this has very rapidly changed, as the thousand acre batchelors have faded away. Now we have six thousand acre batchelors. What happens when they are done? China? Hutterites, bless their hearts.

Instead of thinking ahead though, everyone is horned up for more land. For what? I dunno. I guess to take it with them when they die?

I dunno, maybe it is insurrmountable?

[ajl]

Main reason the countryside is emptying out is due to interest rates never going up. Land speculation, not hard work is the way to get rich in failing states like canuckistan. If rate go up, then retires have a reason to sell assets making them available to others and then we might see repopulation of rural areas. The farming that goes on does so because for the most part it works. Diversification has limited application in our climate and geography. My hat is off to them that make it work. I run a small farm that is fairly conventional with off farm gigs and we make it work for the most part Been somewhat fortunate on the machinery front as that is the biggest pain at smaller scale. Did not inherit land so that it why I am small. As far as your kids, Sheep, I bet one or more will farm as there will be few quality off farm jobs in the future. That is one of the reasons I farm: nothing else to do. If you want to get depressed read help wanted adds. Remember gender and skin color matter are the main qualifications for a good job today. That is reality in today's canuckistan.

[dalek]

Oldest daughter leaves for a 5 year law program next month. I’ll be surprised if she’s back other than to visit, rural life just isn’t her thing
Next oldest isn’t much on farming either but wants to be a chef and she’s also kind of crunchy, locavore kind of thing. I could see her potentially opening a restaurant or some other food business linked with the farm down the road but probably not on the production side.
Oldest son is mechanical, loves wrenching, loves anything to do with logging and the sawmill which we’re expanding a bit. Not much for livestock.
Youngest son is ALL about the animals. Nothing he likes better than working sheep.

No idea where any of this ends up in a decade or two but it’s where things are now