Here we go.\u00a0 It will soon be a time to plant, according to the calendar and Ecclesiastes.\u00a0 Farmers are greasing, fixing, and praying for cooperating weather.\u00a0 It is only one step on the way to growing a crop.\u00a0 But you can\u2019t get to Z (harvest) without starting at A.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s exciting to use the skills we have acquired to get seeds in the ground.\u00a0 There is no better feeling than being bone-tired after a day of planting.\u00a0 After forty-some years of these, I have had near-perfect springs and dreadful ones.\u00a0 My wife will vouch that I am as happy or as grumpy as soil conditions dictate.<\/p>\n
All of us farmers share this work.\u00a0 We cross paths at the parts counter, our seed dealer\u2019s warehouse, and the line fence.\u00a0 There is natural optimism that comes with planting a new crop.\u00a0 We gladly talk about receding snow banks and drying fields.<\/p>\n
If conversation goes deeper though, it gets less cheery.\u00a0 Spring-planting sunshine clouds over.\u00a0 The facts: net farm income has been halved since 2013.\u00a0 Farming returns are at their lowest level since the Eighties.\u00a0 Costs trickle down; meanwhile commodity prices fell off a cliff.\u00a0 Markets were already weak; tariffs put on by trading partners pounded them further.\u00a0 Farm foreclosures are rising.<\/p>\n
Behind facts and numbers are real people, people you and I know.\u00a0 Some farmers are renting out the land, not seeing a reason for putting such time and money into iffy returns.\u00a0 Others who hoped to bring a kid into the operation are encouraging them to get a job where they know they\u2019ll get paid at the end of the pay-period.<\/p>\n
The last few years have been particularly difficult for dairy farmers.\u00a0 The use of the word \u201ccrisis\u201d is not hyperbole.\u00a0 Minnesota\/Wisconsin were the center of the dairy industry for decades.\u00a0 Last year, a thousand dairy farmers quit in those two states.\u00a0 Several friends sold their cows.<\/p>\n
In The World That I Grew Up In, our farm, like most farms, had chickens, pigs, and cows.\u00a0 Poultry became concentrated in large facilities in the 1960\u2019s and 70\u2019s.\u00a0 Pork production followed in the 80\u2019s and 90\u2019s.\u00a0 And now dairy.\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t seem to make much sense when returns are negative, but several giant dairy farms are being built in Minnesota.\u00a0 There will be cows in Minnesota.\u00a0 Only most will be in CAFO\u2019s\u2015concentrated animal feeding operations\u2015not \u201cbarns.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dairy farming is still the best way to treat the land.\u00a0 Field to feed to cow to manure to field is a perfect loop.\u00a0 The rotation can be other than corn and soybeans.\u00a0 There has been attrition of dairy farms since my dad sold his cows in 1975.\u00a0 The ones that remained in this century were the best, the most committed.\u00a0 The crazy thing is, there are people who enjoy that work and lifestyle.\u00a0 If there were profits, dairy farmers\u2019 kids would be taking over.<\/p>\n
Crop farming has remained widely dispersed.\u00a0 Around Sleepy Eye and New Ulm that has been especially true, as families with deep roots worked the fields.\u00a0 There are a number like me who farm some land, maybe have off-farm work, maybe have some livestock.\u00a0 Many are on the farms we grew up on.<\/p>\n
I look around and a lot are my age, or older.\u00a0 What does this look like in twenty years?\u00a0 I\u2019ve had this conversation with a couple farmers this winter.\u00a0 There are a few sons coming home to farm, but not many.\u00a0 I enjoy talking with the young people who are.\u00a0 They are enthusiastic and smart. They even know how to program a planter monitor, which I struggle with.<\/p>\n
But there are less sons entering than fathers leaving.\u00a0 That has been the trend my whole life.\u00a0 Every time we have one of these downturns, it means less farmers.\u00a0 Ten jump off the boat, for every eight who climb back on.<\/p>\n
Ag technology continues its march from horses to hydraulics to auto-steer to self-driving tractors.\u00a0 One sees a future with less people.\u00a0 These remarkable machines aren\u2019t and won\u2019t be cheap.\u00a0 It makes sense to run them over more acres.\u00a0 Take down line fences, pattern tile fields, bulldoze groves, suddenly there\u2019s a lot less people in the picture.<\/p>\n
In previous eras when low prices prevailed there were protests.\u00a0 During the Depression, the Farmer\u2019s Holiday Association rose up to demand help from newly-elected President Roosevelt.\u00a0 The American Agriculture Movement organized a tractorcade on Washington.\u00a0 In Minnesota, Groundswell held rallies at the Capital in the Eighties.<\/p>\n
You don\u2019t hear much now.\u00a0 No one is driving a tractor to Washington.\u00a0 Looking back on earlier hard times, there were more of us out here, more of us to care.\u00a0 In the Thirties, a majority of Americans were tied to farms.\u00a0 Even into the Eighties, most maintained a familial connection to a piece of land, grandparents to visit, maybe a cousin on the home place.\u00a0 Readers who have such ties now are in a minority.<\/p>\n
I hate to say this, but there is a sense of resignation I don\u2019t remember when I was younger.\u00a0 Back then, there were questions whether pigs in confinement or hens in cages would work.\u00a0 For sure, cows needed too much attention to be raised in large herds.\u00a0 Fields needed someone to go out and hoe the cockleburs.\u00a0 Now there are 48-row planters and robot milkers.\u00a0 Robots don\u2019t need a coffee\/doughnut break at 10:00 AM.<\/p>\n
I want to say here, I know people who own and work for the large livestock operations.\u00a0 They are good people, responsible employers, and important drivers to our rural economy.\u00a0 They took advantage of what was given in a changing agriculture, when many of us would have been frightened to take such risks.\u00a0 It has never been useful to pit small farmers against large farmers.<\/p>\n
But I think it is fair to ask, could things have been different?\u00a0 You look at the Farm Bill and see that has done more to promote consolidation than prevent it.\u00a0 There have never been effective limits on subsidies, so it reduced risk for expansion.\u00a0 Maybe our land grant colleges could have focused research on farms of a moderate size.\u00a0 Maybe politicians could have enforced anti-trust laws that were on the books but largely ignored.<\/p>\n
I love this job.\u00a0 The work is a blend of physical and smarts.\u00a0 I know these acres like family.\u00a0 Some are easy to get along with, others are difficult.\u00a0 If it were up to me, I\u2019d do this forever: planting seeds each spring, watching them grow, caring for plants, bringing the harvest six months from now.\u00a0 \u00a0A Krzmarzick has been doing something like that for 120 years on this place.\u00a0 It begins to look possible that will end.\u00a0 That makes me a little sad.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a little sad to see less of us sharing in this ancient art of growing things. \u00a0When I\u2019m done writing, I\u2019m going to go outside and try not to think about any of this.\u00a0 There\u2019s a crop to plant.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
[ad id=”31248″] Here we go.\u00a0 It will soon be a time to plant, according to the calendar and Ecclesiastes.\u00a0 Farmers are greasing, fixing, and praying for cooperating weather.\u00a0 It is only one step on the way to growing a crop.\u00a0 But you can\u2019t get to Z (harvest) without starting at A. It\u2019s exciting to use …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[162],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-112777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-weeds-by-randy-krzmarzick"],"aioseo_notices":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-22 16:15:33","action":"change-status","newStatus":"trash","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112777","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112777"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112777\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":112778,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112777\/revisions\/112778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sleepyeyeonline.com\/goodnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}