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ON-FARM THOUGHTS: Spring is here. Finally.
by Larry Wegner, MFGA Producer Relations
We now, finally, have spring. Everyone is into their “go mode”. The crop producers are putting seed into the ground. The soil is still cold for this time of the year, but seeding is happening. The livestock producers are busy being midwives to the stock. Nothing picks up the spirits of livestock producers than watching the new babies playing in the pasture. With days as slow to warm as we have had, we get dressed in the morning in multi layers and we shed a layer as the day warms up. Where it gets tough on the wardrobe is if we do not follow the same trail home at the end of the day, the next morning we are left scratching our heads as to where we left the outer layers of our clothes.
In the farmer hot stove leagues, we are now having our seemingly annual debate between crop and livestock/forage producers: crop producers do not want rain until the crop is in the ground and forage producers want a warm spring rain to warm the soil and stimulate the forage production for the year. In early May we finally got up to 20C, a temperature we had not crossed since early October, six long months ago.
Not everything has been frigid this spring though. It has been a great spring for Prairie Crocus; we have a sea of purple and white flowers on our native pastures. We have even had a few show up on the tame pasture, while a few bloomed on our covercrop field. And of course, the short, yellow flowers with a circular arrangement of green leaves that I normally pick to give my wife each spring are abundant as well. Just a note from my experience, my wife Rosemary does not appreciate a yellow flower arrangement conveniently pulled from our lawn as much as my mother once did...
Pushing into mid spring, we look at rejuvenating the farm as I have two sons, Herbert and Max, wanting to show me how they are ready to do everything better than how I did, and maybe they can and I suspect they will if they don’t already. They have all the answers before I even know what the question was. And that is part of life. Having two sons that want to be Ag producers is an honour; I know many family farms with different scenarios.
Last fall, I met up with a producer I took my first Holistic Management course with way back in the day. He has four sons wanting to come back to or stay on the farm. In the HM course we had discussed how to make the next generation come back to Ag. Our instructor Don Campbell said we must make it fun and enjoyable for the next generation to want to come back. My classmate and I concluded that we obviously have made it too much fun. I know that we must let the next generation step up and manage the production of the operation and let them enjoy the benefits and learn from their mistakes.
In my proud heart though, it is still tough to let go as this was always my dream job and sometimes sharing is not easy. And neither is stepping aside from a job one loves. As I continue to gain my own life experiences in this stage of life, I know I must let them make their own mistakes (Neil Dennis called them learning experiences…it was only a mistake if we did not learn from them). My new job is to encourage learning and adapting on a farm scale that will not cause a large financial loss. It is a different mindset, from being the one in charge to being a part of the team making decisions. At least I am still part of the team. I have to keep reminding myself that we tend to view the past in rose-colored glasses. In reality, it was the best of times and the worst of times. My new job is to provide a time-tested view of what and why things were done in the past and how I anticipate what is going to happen in the future.
We could not and would not farm today as we did in the 1970’s and 1980’s or whatever decade founded your earlier farm life experiences. It was not all good. But it was not all bad either. We have to cherry pick what would work for us in the past to make ourselves more profitable today. On the other side of the coin is that not everything that is being promoted today will be part of our future. It is a confusing world we live in. In fact, so much so, that in a previous MFGA blog I wrote about mixed messages.
I was told when I started farming that in agriculture “we eat the young”. When I first heard that I thought, no way…that is terrible. Yet, constantly, over time, I have seen and concluded that the saying can be true. The industry encourages our young producers through verbiage like “go big or go home” or “you can not compete with the big producers”. These young producers often set out to prove all wrong, for some that means being over leveraged, enduring a few poor production years, taking on more that their management skills are at and, in the ultimatum of the ultimate worst situations, can be faced with liquidation sale. The financial imbalances of our industry often has existing, experienced producers come in and buy assets up at chopped prices, hence “eating the young”.
I am a student of history. I enjoy listening to and reading stories of Ag producers over time. I can say there never was an easy time to get into Ag production. Over history, some made it and some do not. Nobody promised a rose garden. We are seeing larger and larger-sized farms and ranches all the time. Some say it is driven by the scale of economy. That may be right. Though, I have not often seen a large operation go to a second and, even more rarely, a third generation.
With the current issues around finding solid farm labour and, on top of that, workers that are willing to stay, this may put a restrictor on operations. No one has crystal ball to see into the future (not sure I want to); it is my view the young must have more diverse income streams. A producer then has higher chances they will be here tomorrow and over time when they have a good cash flow is stable, and then they can prioritize their income steams to the main one or two that serve them and their farm best.
On November 13-15, 2023, in Brandon, MB, Manitoba Forage and Grassland Association (MFGA) will be hosting their sixth annual MFGA Regen Ag Conference. The speaker list is growing, and the conference’s producer panels are coming together nicely. On the topic of young producers, we are having a panel of second-generation Regen Ag producers. This concept came from my son Max on the drive home after last year’s conference stated, “you have speakers talking about becoming a regen ag producer, what about young producers like me who grew up farming this way, WHAT DO I LOOK AT TO LEARN TO BE BETTER.”
It was a great thought and I wrote it down when I got home. On our drive home, I informed Max that he was actually third generation to farm this way. My father told me as a child that if you did not have earth worms, your soil was not healthy and he thrived to make sure the earth worms were on the land we managed. My dad said that the healthier the soil, the less input required, and a long-term crop rotation was essential. I tried to prove him wrong and that was not the modern way to farm. Of course, over time, I proved him right. I hope my sons learn faster than I did. He did let me figure it out on my own. I now see the value of learning from our experiences.
The speakers we have lined up for the 2023 MFGA conference this year were selected to make you think and hopefully to have you look into what you can change to improve your finances and improve your soil health. Dr. Jonathan Lundgren, CEO of Blue Dasher Farms is working on case studies of 1000 regenerative farms in North America. I am very interested in his study and findings. From the University of Calgary, Dr. Paul Galpern, associate professor of biological science, will present on creating a win-win with Precision Ag and wildlife habitat. Well-known and well-regarded Brandon Rockey from Colorado USA is a seed potato breeder and producer. While Brandon has a potato background, he is leading edge in the way he thinks through on ways to deal with everything on the farm, from pests to soil fertility in the arid climes of Colorado. Everyone will learn from Brandon’s presentation.
The conference will also feature home-grown Prairie farm leaders. Ian Steppler is from the Miami MB area. Ian is a beekeeper and chairman of Manitoba Beekeeper Association and is part of his family’s Steppler Farms. Ian will talk about the line he has to walk between the apiary and running a large farming operation. I strongly believe that the bee industry is our modern “canary in the coal mine”. Bees are hit first and hard by what happens in the fields around them.
From Axten Farms in south central Saskatchewan, we will learn from a working partnership of husband-and-wife team Derek and Tannis Axten. I did a tour of the Axten’s operation two years ago. It was well worth my time and money for the tour. Together, the Axten’s operate a large family farm that embraces inner cropping, diversity crop mix, compost tea, forage buffer zones on edge of the fields and waterways, a seed separation plant and a flour mill.
I am looking forward to this year’s conference not only as a place of learning but also a place to meet other producers going down the same path of Regen Ag. Registration will be open in June with the Early Bird offer as provided every year. I encourage producers that want to look at new and different ways for their operation’s production to look into the funds available to help try out some of these practices. There seems to be a lot of different funding sources and we have no idea how long these different sources will last. There is no better time to try a few acres than now. Where are you taking your future?
Have a great, hopefully warmer spring season.
Until next time,
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