Arkansas

Rice Delphacid Expands Across Mid-South

Wed, 29 Apr 2026 16:22:00 GMT

First documented in Texas in 2015, the rice delphacid has gradually expanded its footprint. In 2025, it appeared in Louisiana, Arkansas and Mississippi, putting the Mid-South region’s rice industry on alert. While Texas growers have nearly a decade of experience managing the pest, other states are still learning how it behaves in local conditions.

Comparison of two rice plants: (Left) plant exhibiting split-stem traits; (Right) healthy, normal plant.

(Mississippi)

Texas: Managing an Evolving Threat

In Texas, rice delphacid is no longer a new threat; it’s an evolving one.

“In the three years I’ve been in this role, they’ve shown up earlier every year,” says Sam Rustom, Texas Extension rice specialist.

Once considered primarily a ratoon crop pest, delphacids are now appearing in main crop rice earlier in the season. In 2024, populations emerged in July. By 2025, they were detected as early as June.

“The most severe damage occurs from panicle differentiation to soft dough,” Rustom says. “This is when hoppers feed on the sugars and stored carbohydrates that are supposed to fill the grain, resulting in both yield and quality loss.”

Rustom recommends scouting as soon as rice transitions from vegetative to reproductive stages, especially in aromatic varieties, which appear particularly attractive to delphacids.

“Our recommendation has been to spray on first detection,” Rustom says. “When we let populations get out of control, they will stay out of control.”

Courier, an IGR available through a Section 18 exemption, is currently the primary management tool. While it targets nymphs and provides residual protection, long-term solutions like resistant varieties and improved insecticides for adults are still in development.

“It’s going to help bridge the gap – until we get long-term solutions,” Rustom says.

Rice delphacid observed on a rice plant.

(Mississippi)

Louisiana: Monitoring Migration and the Importance of Timing

In Louisiana, efforts are focused on early detection and understanding how the pest behaves under local conditions.

“We are doing a statewide monitoring survey for the delphacid,” says Tyler Musgrove, Louisiana Extension rice specialist.

He says the program was scheduled to begin on April 1. Researchers are using sweep nets, sticky cards and even a DVAC to track populations.

Louisiana’s rice-crawfish rotation system might also influence the pest’s survival.

“Rice and crawfish are grown in rotation – which means food resources and habitat may persist longer into the winter,” Musgrove says.

That extended availability of habitat ties into a larger question researchers are still working to answer. Does the pest survive locally, or must it reestablish each season?

“There’s a theory that rice delphacids don’t overwinter locally, but instead migrate in each year,” Musgrove says.

Based on 2024 observations, that migration could lead to peak pressure later in the season, with significant populations expected around July.

Even so, last year’s outbreaks pointed to one factor growers can control – timing.

“Our current recommendation to producers is to plant as early as possible within the recommended window,” Musgrove explains. “The rice that was hit the hardest was the rice that was planted the latest.”

He emphasizes planting date isn’t just important for rice, but across agriculture as a whole.

That trend held across multiple states in 2024, with later-planted fields in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas consistently experiencing the greatest pressure.

Rice delphacid observed on a rice plant.

(Arkansas)

Arkansas: Facing a Major Unknown

For Arkansas, 2026 might be the first true test.

“Time will tell,” says Nick Bateman, Arkansas crop entomologist. “We’ve had about six weeks’ worth of experience with it, so it’s a major unknown.”

Unlike Texas, Arkansas has little historical presence of the pest. Surveys conducted decades ago failed to detect either the insect or the virus it can carry.

Recent winter weather may have reduced early populations this year.

“That cold front – it looks like the weather should have been cold enough to knock them out,” Bateman says.

Still, migration from Texas remains a concern.

“There’s no telling if it will happen again this year,” Bateman says. “It wouldn’t surprise me if we deal with it on a yearly basis.”

As in Louisiana, planting dates could play a critical role.

“If we can get rice planted in April, I think we’ll outrun a lot of the major issues,” Bateman says.

Rice delphacid observed on a rice plant.

(Arkansas)

Proactive Scouting and Management Tips

Across all three states, one message is clear – scouting must start earlier and be more aggressive.

“They need to be sweeping it with a sweep net, particularly where vegetation is thick,” Bateman says.

Producers should watch for early signs of damage, including hopper burn, which is characterized by small, irregular patches of browning.

In Louisiana, Musgrove also recommends checking grassy areas around fields early in the season, where populations might establish before moving into rice.

Management options remain limited. Courier, the Section 18-approved insecticide, is currently the primary tool available across the region.

However, improper insecticide use might worsen the issue.

“When we treated for rice stink bug, the rice delphacid immediately followed,” Musgrove says, referencing pest resurgence.

Avoiding broad-spectrum pyrethroids might help reduce that risk.

A Looming Viral Threat

Beyond feeding damage, the rice delphacid presents an even greater concern – its ability to transmit Hoja Blanca virus. There is no cure once the infection occurs.

“You’ve got to control the insect in order to control the virus,” Musgrove says.

Although the virus has only been confirmed in Texas so far, researchers expect it to spread.

“It’s a matter of when, not if,” Musgrove says.

With limited research and increasing pressure, specialists agree vigilance will be critical moving forward.

Ag Lender Warns Farm Finances Under Greatest Stress Since the 1980s

Fri, 19 Sep 2025 16:12:17 GMT

As combines chew through this year’s crops, farmers are faced with a bleak reality: this crop they’re harvesting is coming at a steep financial loss. And for some, this marks the fourth year in a row they won’t make any money.

“What the general public doesn’t realize is these things have not just occurred over the last six months. This started in 2021 and 2022,” says Tommy Young, who farms in Newport, Ark. “In our particular situation, we started noticing shortfalls in 2021 and 2022 simply because of the input costs.”

That worry and concern took center stage and was at the heart of a meeting in Brookeland, Ark., earlier this month. A meeting that was supposed to be just a handful of farmers at a local bank turned into more of a movement. And for farmers, there was one resounding message: We need help, and we need it now.

“I think when everyone, other farmers, started seeing how many farmers showed up, it changed the overall dynamic of the meeting. It made it become emotional. It made it become more than reverence, from the standpoint that it made me feel personally that I’ve not done anything wrong,” Young says.

‘It Felt Just Like a Funeral’

In the middle of harvest, farmers from across Arkansas, southern Missouri and Tennessee parked their combines to attend the meeting. Young says as he parked his vehicle and saw trucks lining the road and lines of people standing outside to get in, the somber mood became very real.

“It felt just like a funeral,” Young says. “And then when we got inside, you didn’t see signs being held up. You didn’t hear screaming or any kind of thing like that. You saw people that were genuinely concerned about the industry as a whole.”

Young says during that meeting, the frustration farmers voiced came down to three main concerns within the ag economy:

Record-high input costs
Low commodity prices
The loss of key export markets

It’s those three factors fueling a perfect storm, but farmers are considerably concerned about the record-high input costs and what’s fueling those in agriculture.

“All we can do is hope for the best, be as efficient as we possibly can be with what we’re doing, and then thinking things would change. Well, they have not changed. They’ve gotten worse,” Young says.

Ag Lender Says Farmers Are Seeing the Most Financial Stress Since the 1980s

Greg Cole is president and CEO of AgHeritage Farm Credit Services, which serves roughly 6,700 members across 24 counties in Arkansas. Cole started in ag lending in 1984, and he says as Arkansas farmers stare at loss on every crop they grow, it’s not a repeat of the 1980s, but it’s eerily similar.

“I can tell you this, this is the most stress I’ve seen since the ‘80s when you come to farm profitability, i.e. farmers losing money,” Cole says. “One positive we have now compared to the ‘80s is land values. Our land values are still positive, which gives some lendable equity —unlike in the 80s, when I started my career, when U.S. farmland prices plummeted in some areas up to 60%.”

With a drastic drop in commodity prices, but input prices still record or near-record high, Cole says farmers in Arkansas, specifically, have been eroding balance sheets for four straight years.

“We started seeing losses in ’22 when 40% of our producers lost money,” Cole says. “In ’23, about 50% lost money. And then last year, in ’24, 70% lost money, with the average loss of about $150 an acre. And that’s after they received about a $50 per acre ECAP payments. Today, we’re looking at where we stand now. We could have a similar level of losses in ‘25 that we had in ‘24. Even though in ’24, we had very strong yields. But now we have weaker yields.”

As mounting debt shows up on the balance sheets, Cole says there are two types of farmers seeing the most severe financial strain.

“The ones who rent most of the land, especially if they pay on the higher end of rent. And here in the Mississippi Delta, most farmers who have a lot of acres rent most of their ground,” Cole says. “And then young, beginning farmers who didn’t have the opportunity to build up a lot of equity. Those are the ones that have occurred these multiple year losses where their balance sheet debt has swollen to a level that’s hard to service a debt when you add the interest rate cost on top of it.”

Farmers On the Brink of Being Forced Out of Farming

Cole says in talking to farm credit colleagues from across the country, next to the central valley of California, farmers in the Mississippi region are in the most severe shape.

“There were 62 farm equipment sales in eastern Arkansas this past winter,” Cole says. “That’s the most I can recall, anecdotally speaking, than any time in my career since the 1980s. And I think what we’re looking at now is at least that many or more. It could be double that if we don’t get major intervention in the markets or an intervention from D.C.

Cole continues: “Really, what we need is another ad hoc payment, maybe in a form of an MFP-type payment that we received back in Covid. But we need some major help here, or we’re going to have a lot less farmers in 2026 and 2027.”

It’s a desperate plea across agriculture. Without some type of market or government intervention, some could be forced out of farming this year — similar to what happened in the 1980s.

“My dad, in 1978, went to Washington D.C., stood on the capitol and was there during that time when they drove tractors to D.C.,” Young says. “It was the same thing in Brookeland, Arkansas. And if this thing continues, I think it will go nationwide because we’ve got to get through this. And the president and congress have got to make it to where we have good markets, sustainable markets and markets that we can depend on long term.”

Largest Drop in Crop Cash Receipts Ever

It’s not just farmers in the Delta seeing the financial strain. Ag economist John Newton tells AgDay’s Michelle Rook that even though the overall net farm income picture from USDA looks strong, it’s a very different situation when you take out livestock and just look at crops.

“If you look at the data, crop cash receipts over the last three years have declined by $71 billion,” says Newton, executive head of Terrain. “When adjusted for inflation, that matches the largest decline that we’ve seen in history. So, the pressure in the crop space is very real.”

NCGA and ASA Also Sounding the Alarm

National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) is also sounding the alarm , saying agriculture is nearing a financial crisis. According to a new study released by NCGA, nearly half (46%) of U.S. farmers believe we are on the brink of a farm crisis, and 65% are more concerned now about their farm financials than a year ago.

American Soybean Association (ASA)CEO Stephen Censky also sees and hears the growing concern among farmers.

“It’s tough, and I can hear it in the stress in our members’ voices Our members and our board of directors are really concerned right now,” Censky says. “Some say if things don’t turn around, if we don’t get markets back or if we get economic assistance — which is not our first choice — this could be their last year in farming. That’s pretty scary.”

Censky says this time in agriculture is more serious than the last trade war simply because crop prices are lower than they were in 2018, and input prices are significantly higher.

“I will say while those programs we had, the market facilitation payments (MFP), they help keep folks in business. They stop the blood loss. They help farmers survive until the next year, but it’s not a replacement for markets,” Censky says. “And no farmer wants to be dependent on getting his or her income from the government, or from the mailbox, rather than from the marketplace.”

Farmers are also voicing frustration lately that when government assistance is given, they are simply a pass-through. The payments keep input prices elevated, and also seem to prop up high land values.

“One of the things is that when you provide economic assistance or any kind of government payments, whether that is through the reference prices and the ARC and PLC programs under the farm programs, yes, that helps. It helps keep farmers in business and helps them pay the bills. But longer term, any form of government assistance like that gets capitalized into land rents and land values, and that has consequences as well for farmers,” Censky says.

Yet, Censky was part of the Trump administration. He served as the United States Deputy Secretary of Agriculture from 2017 through 2020. That was also during the first trade war with China, and he knows the loss of the Chinese market is completely out of farmers’ control.

“We have not been publicly calling for another MFP-type program. Our priority has been ‘Let’s get a deal with China on soybeans’, because having that market is what soybean farmers want,” Censky says. “And by restoring and getting rid of the retaliatory tariffs, and ideally getting some purchase commitments from China, would be like we did under the Phase One trade deal with China. That would be great. And that also puts a lid on, or a damper on, Brazilian expansion, which has long-term benefits for the U.S. soybean industry as well.”

Success Measured Differently: This Arkansas Farmer Is Not Bound By Legacy

Fri, 06 Jun 2025 15:29:43 GMT

Anchored with a family legacy and personal interest in farming, you’ll find Dalton Dilldine building a farming operation with attention to detail and natural curiosity.

“When we travel, I like to think about what I would do if I lived there,” Dilldine says. “I wish I had the opportunity to go to New York and walk up to someone in a suit and job shadow them for a day. I think it would be fascinating to see and understand how they spend their time.”

The continuous thread of his family’s operation drives Dilldine to overcome any obstacles and challenges in farming.

One such moment includes his father’s sudden death in 2010 at the age of 55.

At the age of 18, Dilldine was faced with the circumstances of his father’s passing: he could continue the family’s farm business, start his own entity or choose to go to college. As the type of guy who would choose “all of the above” to a multiple choice question, he did all three. Dilldine has since carried forward a legacy of farming that goes back to his great grandfather’s start with 154 acres in 1926. Dilldine Farms was in existence for decades, eventually operated by his parents. Once Dilldine was of age, he created Mezza Luna Farms.

Based in Mississippi County, Ark., the business is now over 5,900 acres and focuses on row crops.

For his achievements in the business of farming, Dilldine was awarded the 2025 Top Producer Next Gen Award, sponsored by Fendt and Pioneer.

(Lloyd Photography)

Business Management
Legacy has not bound him, rather he’s harnessed creativity in problem solving with hard labor. He straddles honoring the family farm’s foundation while finding new ways of doing business and becoming more enlightened.

For example, he’s recently taken to using ChatGPT as a brainstorming tool.

“I’ve asked it to ask me 10 questions about the farm so it better understands our business,” he says. “Then, it can respond when I prompt it to tell me how I can make improvements in certain aspects of the operation.”

With some curves in the road and bumps along the way, his trajectory remains firm. This is despite the farm looking quite different than when his father operated it.

“Before my dad’s passing, it was a large farm — actually spread across two farms,” he explains. “And honestly, I don’t think we would be in as good of shape if we were farming all that ground today. I am the one making the decisions, and I don’t know how well my decisions would go farming that many acres. As technical as farming is in our area, it would be overwhelming at that scale.”

Dilldine says he invests in how he manages the relationships in the business to help him grow, and when the time is right, more acres will bring larger scale. For now, he remains focused on the details, including a water hole on a 20 acre field.

“Some guys wouldn’t worry about something like that, but the little stuff adds up.”

His heart compels him to labor on the farm as his mind focuses on the business details.

“This is a high stakes business,” Dilldine says. “You have to be detailed-oriented.”

His No. 1 stated goal for the farm is profitability for short-term and long-term success.

Ask him about management of the farm, and he references his spreadsheets — whether it be for bidding out inputs, landlord contacts, etc. — but then he starts talking about the relationships behind those rows and columns.

With facts and numbers in mind, he balances the personal and relationship side of the business. The weight of loyalty tips the balance on the scale for Dilldine.

“When I hire you, I plan for you to stay long term,” he says. “We’ve had more people pass away still working for us than we’ve let go.”

And longevity in time working for the farm is common. One key employee is secretary and bookkeeper Delois Tittle, who has worked for the family for almost 40 years.

(Lloyd Photography)

Not Just a Tractor Driver
Over the years, Dilldine has shifted what his day-to-day work looks like.

“The biggest transition for me, individually, is now I have trained employees to do the labor intensive work I did in previous years. But I still tell and show all my guys I would do anything I am asking them to do,” he says.

Whereas success used to look like acres covered in a day, now Dalton Dilldine has a different perspective. Since evolving to more of a manager, and less time in the cab himself, Dilldine says he measures progress differently.

“I’m trying to do my best every day. At the end, I look for the reward in the day. There’s always going to be tomorrow. Let go of yesterday, and try to enjoy the success of the day. There’s always at least something positive,” he says.

In the spring of 2025, that looks like getting through six straight days of planting without a break or slowdown.

“There are things I now realize I can’t do from the cab of the sprayer,” Dilldine says. “I’ve got a guy trained to run our sprayer, and he’s done an excellent job. Letting someone else do the spraying is a huge role for me, but it’s taken something off my plate.”

He reflects on a time when he was the one in the sprayer, and his training and team organization today feels like a weight taken off his shoulders.

(Lloyd Photography)

“For a non-farmer, the most surprising thing is the time I spend in my pickup — 60% to 80% of my time at work is in my truck facilitating the next task of the day in some shape or form,” he says.

With the current structure, he’s able to focus differently and be more efficient.

“This is a business, and as it’s owner and operator, I no longer get to spend my hours as a tractor driver,” he says.

In 2019, Dilldine had an on-farm accident. While operating the sprayer at a low rate of speed, the back wheels hit a 3’ ditch, resulting in the air ride seat bottoming out, and unfortunately breaking his back.

“My wife, who is a nurse practitioner, was working in the ER when I was brought in,” Dilldine says.

Through those 10 weeks of rest and rehabilitation, Dilldine says he learned patience and how to delegate.

“At the foundation, we have to trust each other on the farm. Trust the people you have hired and worked with so when it’s crunch time, they are going to do the best job they can,” he says. “I also learned how to give good notes — how to communicate what needed to be done with expectations of the outcome.”

Three years ago, Dilldine expanded his farm team using H-2A labor, and again he can report consistency with employees repeating their term on the farm year after year.

Methodical Approach
“I try really hard, taking one step in the right direction — whether it’s a baby step or a jump as far as I can jump. Every decision, I make it thoughtful and educated,” he says.

Unafraid to tackle problems with creative solutions or out-of-the-box thinking, Dilldine purchased a commercial grain facility during the 2022 harvest season amid a drought that was leading to significant decreases in basis due to low river levels.

With 750,000 bu. of total storage, Dilldine says he uses three-fourths of the capacity currently. Originally built in the 1940s, the facility had since been out of use.

“Regarding the grain bins, people didn’t see it for what it was and honestly, what it is now. The grainery was basically dilapidated, but now its a wealth of informatics and technology on the inside. Seeing it back up and running, it’s valuable. It’s as nice or nicer than where I deliver my finished product to,” Dilldine says. “I can dump trucks in about six minutes, and I can load them out in about 12 minutes — which is pretty fast for a private grain facility.”

(Lloyd Photography)

Another example is how Dilldine added drone spraying to his operation.

“I took an entire year of planning that I was going to get a drone and learning all I could,” he says. “And I had a friend who has done it for a few years now, so it was nice to have a contact for planning and troubleshooting.”

This past year, Dilldine was eager to see what the drone is capable of in supplementing his ground sprayer for applications through the season.

“It’s been a huge benefit to be able to spray right after a rain. And if I need something done right away, it’s a supplemental tool to my ground rig sprayer. It’s saving me money, and I’m getting to apply the chemicals when I want to.”

Measure of Success
Building his network, such as the friend who had experience with drone spraying or talking to farmers about how they are also using ChatGPT, is a goal for Dilldine.

“I’m doing everything I can to be as efficient as possible. And when it comes to how I could improve things on my farm, I know networking is always going to be a great tool,” Dilldine describes.

The sharing of ideas is a two-way street. For example, Dilldine built out a spray tender trailer after looking at the setup of dozens. He settled on his design, and then five other farmers have since replicated the plans.

Plans for the Future
In farming, Dilldine is grateful for the opportunities he has pursued, and with growth in mind, he often approaches his landlords with propositions that benefit both parties.

“I want to show how we are taking care of the land we have and how my efforts can benefit us both financially and cultivate sustainability of the land,” he says.

As he works on making both the daily and long-term strategic decisions for the family’s operation, Dilldine says he often wonders what his father would think if he was here.

“I wish I could ask him today ‘Was buying the grain bins a good job? Was leveling this field the right answer? Should I have put risk out there and bought more land?’ I had to learn a lot on my own,” he says.

(Lloyd Photography)

But he’s quick to answer if he’s had any failures in farming, with a no.

“I know you’ve got to let mistakes go, and do your best every day,” he says. “At the time, make the best decision with the information you currently have. And it’s been hard work, but I’ve tried hard to not look at any failure as a failure. I’ve had hardships, but they are just learning experiences.”

And this coming June, alongside his wife, Skiver, Dilldine will have the joy of becoming a first-time dad.

“In 25 years, I hope my daughter is well on her way through life, and if she wants to farm, I hope we have everything ready for her to be able to do so,” he says.

Dalton Dilldine (pictured with his wife, Skiver), received the Next Gen Award during the 2025 Top Producer Summit in Kansas City. This award, which is sponsored by Pioneer and Fendt, is given to a grower under the age of 40, who demonstrates excellence in the business of farming. The deadline for this year’s award is Sept. 1.

(Jim Barcus)

Dalton Dilldine: Next-Generation Producer Follows in His Father's Footsteps

Tue, 18 Feb 2025 22:00:00 GMT

Fourth-generation Arkansas farmer Dalton Dilldine always dreamed of farming and following in his father’s footsteps.

“I knew I wanted to farm and really couldn’t imagine doing anything else,” he says.

But Dilldine’s dad unexpectedly passed away when he was a senior in high school with a limited succession plan in place — leaving him with the choice to take over the operation, start his own farm or go to college.

He chose all three.

“I would go to school and come home every weekend. After I graduated, I started taking over the whole operation and really tried to do things that my father would be proud of - and that I could be proud for myself. I just tried to do my best every day.”

Expanding With Innovation
Located in the Delta of Arkansas, he co-managed Half Moon Farm with his mother until 2010 when he went on his own, creating Mezza Luna Farms. Now, Dilldine grows 6,000 acres of cotton, soybeans, wheat, corn and rice. Of those acres, 2,700 are owned and the rest rented. The farm also has four full-time employees and several H-2A workers.

His strategy for the operation is continuous improvement with a focus on profitability.

“One of my big goals is to just try to be efficient, whatever can be done. We use technology and buy bigger equipment to be able to do more with less,” he says. “Just finding people who want to work on our farm and want to help and understand how a farm works has been a big help for us.”

He also pushes his yields, working with NRCS on conservation programs and quickly adapting to new technology.

“We have moisture sensors in our fields that will tell me the optimal time to start and turn off irrigation. There’s automation in most of our wells, too. I can start them with my phone and turn them off. They’ll tell me if something’s going on,” he explains. “Our equipment with GPUs are an asset to see what’s going on in the field from my office. That’s been a huge blessing.”

Dilldine also purchased a commercial grain entity during the 2022 harvest season amid a drought that was leading to significant decreases in basis due to low river levels.

“It’s about 750,000 bushel storage. Right now, we can use about 600,000 of that capability,” he says. “I can dump trucks in about six minutes, and I can load them out in about 12 - which is pretty fast for a private grain facility.”

Adversity Strikes Twice
On top of losing his father, the beginning of Dilldine’s farming career was made even more challenging when he suffered a major injury that crushed two vertebrae in his back.

“I had a long road of recovery right in the beginning of farming,” he remembers. “I had to do a whole lot of talking on the phone and teaching somebody else how to run that sprayer. It was a lot to deal with.”

But he learned a valuable lesson that has served him well on the farm.

“I taught myself to be a whole lot more patient and to not be wide open all the time,” he says.

Dilldine’s wife, Skiver, who also assists on the farm when she’s not busy as a nurse practitioner, says she couldn’t be prouder of his progress.

“He didn’t have a mentor in his younger years to kind of guide him through some of the hard farming lessons, and he’s learned those on his own with the help of others. He’s just really put in a lot of legwork, a lot of tears and blood, and just really powered through all the adversities to come out on top,” she says.

Despite these challenges, Dilldine says he’s reached many of his farming goals - and others can too.

“I want young farmers to be aware that you can do it. It’s not impossible as often as it feels like,” he adds.

Pete's Pick of the Week: John Deere Tractors Take the Spotlight

Mon, 27 Jan 2025 09:26:00 GMT

For the last week of January, Machinery Pete has selected a 1980 John Deere 4640 out of Sheffield, Ill., that sold for $57,250 at BigIron Auctions for his Pete’s Pick of the Week.

Pete’s Pick of the Week for January 26, 2025.

(BigIron.com)

The listed operating hours on this 45-year old tractor (1,708) are a bit deceiving: Machinery Pete says it has been overhauled with a reman engine and quad range transmission. It also has upgraded steps and an add-on LED lighting package with extended mirrors.

Why Pete Picked It: Machinery Pete says this machine has undergone “basically tons of detail work to make it look new, and I mean it did look like new.”

The price it brought at auction is the third highest used auction price ever for a 1980 John Deere 4640. The all-time record is $61,000, set at a Sullivan Auctioneers auction in Bingham Lake, Minn., in August 2019.

At that same Sheffield, Ill., auction, a 2023 John Deere 8RX 410 with only 208 hours sold for $352,750. Considering a comparable model is currently listed for sale online at a large Midwest-based John Deere dealer for $579,900, it seems fair to say the lucky buyer took home quite a bargain.

One of four 2022 JD 8R 410 tractors.

(Machinery Pete Facebook)

Four 2022 John Deere 8R 410 tractors sold for an average price of $343,750 at a Wheeler Auctions & Real Estate consignment sale in Paris, Mo. That’s down about $6,000 from last year’s average auction price of $349,660, which according to Machinery Pete is down 14% from the 2023 average price.

On Monday, Machinery Pete joined Chip Flory on “AgriTalk.” Catch his segment here:

Dealer acquisition news
Machinery Pete shared that Eis Implement, a third-generation, family-owned John Deere dealership located near Manitowoc, Wis., is being acquired by Riesterer & Schnell, another family-owned John Deere dealer with deep roots in The Badger State.

And in Illinois, Martin Tractor and Prairie State Tractor are merging together and joining forces with Heritage Tractor. Heritage has dealerships in Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas and now in Illinois. The newly merged Illinois dealer network will operate across 22 outlets.

“There’s a lot happening in the dealer space and it’s driven by this inventory and pressure on dealers to pay 8% interest on all their used stuff,” Peterson told AgriTalk Radio host Chip Flory. “But one thing I’m seeing, Chip, as these dealers get bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger, it is fascinating to me they are exerting a lot of pressure back on the manufacturer and it’s doing things I’ve never seen before. So, the ecosystem is changing as we speak.”

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Have a used tractor you’re looking to sell? List it with MachineryPete.com , the most trusted name in farm equipment, reaching thousands of prospective buyers every day. Follow Machinery Pete on Facebook and on YouTube for the latest updates straight from the man himself.

Fallout from Francine: Hurricane Wreaks Havoc on Barge Traffic and Shutters Key Ports

Thu, 12 Sep 2024 20:03:08 GMT

Farmers in the southern U.S. rushed to harvest key crops like cotton and rice ahead of Hurricane Francine’s arrival.

Francine made landfall Wednesday as a Category 2 hurricane about 60 miles southwest of New Orleans, before weakening to Category 1. A state of emergency is in effect for Louisiana and Mississippi. New Orleans is under a shelter-in-place order after evacuation windows closed.

Impacts:
The Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) said that as of Sept. 11, personnel were evacuated from 171 production platforms in the Gulf, 46% of the 371 manned platforms in operation there. People have been evacuated from three non-dynamically positioned (DP) rigs, equivalent to 60% of the five rigs of that type operating, with a total of four DP rigs have been moved out of the path of the storm, 20% of the 20 DP rigs operating in the Gulf. BSEE estimates that approximately 38.56% of the current oil production and 48.77% of the current natural gas production in the Gulf of Mexico has been shut-in.

Barge traffic has also been interrupted, with Mike Steenhoek of the Soy Transportation Coalition noting that barge companies are not sending barge flotillas into the region until the storm has moved on.

USDA reported that as of Sept. 8, 72% of cotton bolls were open in Louisiana, 69% in Mississippi, 83% in Arkansas, 46% in Alabama, and 44% in Georgia, leaving those fields susceptible to damage from heavy rains and wind.

The toughest harvest rush for a rice 🌾 farmer, is going full throttle before a hurricane. Overwhelming emotional, fueled with adrenaline rushes, pushing the limits, and trying to be perfect at an unsustainable pace. I hope all is safe, 🙏
— Scott Matthews (@SMatthewsfarms) September 12, 2024

Several port locations have also been shuttered with Port Fourchon, Louisiana, closed to vessel traffic along with ports of New Orleans, Plaquemines, Cameron, Lake Charles and Houma.

Flood Warnings and Destructive Winds

As the storm’s center moved north through Louisiana, officials warned of potential tornadoes and dangerous storm surge. Francine is expected to continue into Mississippi Thursday, with flood warnings extending to Florida. Francine brought hurricane-force winds, heavy rainfall, and storm surge to coastal Louisiana.

New Orleans reported wind gusts of 78 mph as the eyewall passed through. This marks Louisiana’s first hurricane landfall since the devastating Hurricane Ida in 2021.

From Race Car Driver to Arkansas Farmer, How Travis Senter's Obsession With Data is Paying Off

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 16:43:02 GMT

If proof is in the pudding, Arkansas farmer Travis Senter’s sea of soybeans may be the sign of how paying attention to every detail can add up.

“It’s not uncommon for us to grow 70-bushel [per acre] beans, 80-bushel beans, 90-bushel beans. We can grow good soybeans here,” admits Senter, who farms in Keiser, Ark.

Senter’s soybean crop looks like a monster this year, but that’s not what his mind is focused on most days. Unlike many farmers you meet, he’s always thinking about technology and what’s next. For him, big yields start with collecting and recording as much data as possible every time a piece of equipment enters the field.

“I hate not recording data when we’re going across the field, no matter what we’re doing,” he says. “I want to make sure we’re recording and getting that information because you don’t know when you’re going to use that information.”

That’s a lot of data, considering Senter’s family, along with their local farming partner, farm more than 20,000 acres. Senter says it’s technology and data that help him manage all those acres effectively and efficiently.

“I’ve always been interested in computers, building computers,” says Senter. “Whether it’s technology or equipment, I’m always trying to be a cutting edge. When autosteer came along and when John Deere introduced all this technology with the JDLink System , my father was a little bit older, and he couldn’t really figure out some of this stuff. So that was sort of my niche to get involved in farming and to really ramp up our technology side of things.”

A Generational Shift

Finding a niche is exactly what Senter did, and he went all in. If you walk into his office today, there’s not a single piece of paper on his desk. Everything is focused on technology, including dual 49” displays for his computer.

More Screen Real Estate!…..👌🏻 #farmtech #opscenter @JohnDeere pic.twitter.com/MkeSHEwTEK
— Travis Senter (@traviss22) April 15, 2024

That view is quite the contrast from Travis’ dad’s office. Walk into his office, which is just across the hall, and there’s a clear difference in technology use.

“I have an iPhone, but no, I don’t have a computer,” says Travis Senter Sr., with a smile.

Instead, the way he keeps records is a little more old school: he uses a classic pen and paper.

“I write it down. I have one of these books for every year of my farm and career,” he says, while holding up a composition notebook. “I write down planting dates, varieties, irrigation. I run out of pages, and I write down everything, and then I go back to it.”

Travis Senter, Jr., talks to his dad Travis Senter, Sr.

(Mike Byers )

Travis Sr. may be more old school, but he finds great value—and pride—in what his son’s already done.

“When he came home out of college, he was already running and gunning. I knew I had something special,” says Travis Sr. “With my son coming on board, helping us, it has really opened up things. He brought a lot of new things to the farm that makes it easier, and I love all that stuff. It’s just I’m a little slower at it. I want him to get it, and we just keep investing in it, because we know it helps the farm.”

The Go-To-Guy for Technology

Travis Senter isn’t just the technology whisperer on the family farm, he’s everybody’s go-to guy in the Keiser area for technology. And how he learns and keeps up on the latest tech trends is by simply experimenting.

“It’s a lot of trial and error,” he admits. “You want to go all in and buy the next greatest thing, but that’s not always the best way. I’ve watched a lot of farmers spend hundreds of thousands of dollars for things that they’ll not use in two years from now, because that company will go bankrupt,” he adds. “So, you’ve got to do your research and try to figure out exactly what works best for you.”

Monitoring the progress! #farmtech #opscenter @JohnDeere @GoGreenwayEquip pic.twitter.com/dzE0bFcToh
— Travis Senter (@traviss22) October 21, 2023

When Senter finds something that works, he goes all in. That was the case when he was trying to find a way to stay connected to all of the family’s machines on the farm, and it’s not just a few tractors to keep track of. They have a massive fleet. Senter says they operate 33 tractors, three cotton pickers, three combines, four sprayers, a number of excavators and 20 semi-trucks.

“We had one or two units we were swapping from this tractor to that tractor, and so it was kind of a pain. I finally worked out a deal and thought, ‘What if we just get everything connected? Get autosteer on everything, put displays in everything, do recording on everything,’ because that makes life a lot easier. You don’t have to worry about what’s recording here, what’s recording there. Just bring it all in.”

Ops Center

(Travis Senter)

How Racing Made Him a Better Farmer

Senter has a love for technology, and he also has a love for racing with rows and rows of awards and trophies to show for it.

“In what I call my previous life, I was a race car driver and not only a race car driver, I was also a race car builder,” he says.

Travis Senter Racing

(Travis Senter)

For 20 years, Senter traveled across the country, and even the world, building and driving race cars.

“Data collection in racing is probably done more so than in farming,” says Senter. “I had extreme amounts of data on my race car in 2005 to record where I go, where I’m at, all this information that I would study and try to be better. And so that exact thing is what amplified my sensors and my data collection for farming.”

Senter says the ability to collect information in racing is what helped him become an even better race car driver. Today, his ability to collect information and data is what is making him an even better farmer.

“Building race cars, racing race cars, has definitely helped me be a better farmer, which is strange to say,” says Senter.

Using ChatGPT as a Tool on the Farm

Senter’s time on the track may also be why he’s so willing to take risks today and try things that are unheard of on the farm. One example is the way he’s grabbed onto artificial intelligence (AI).

“Taking ChatGPT, for example, you can throw some of your data in there and it will spit out what you’re expected to make. And, if you can throw in enough information and give it the right prompts, I feel like we could change our decision-making,” he says.

I asked ChatGPT to describe an image I took this afternoon and then I asked it to draw that description with Dall-E3. The results are amazing. #ChatGPT pic.twitter.com/ei2sIDayIA
— Travis Senter (@traviss22) October 20, 2023

Last summer, before there was the ability with ChatGPT to add files, Senter and his own son created their own AI model. The goal was to take their 10-year yield history in every field, add in planting and harvesting dates, the varieties or hybrids they planted, and combine that information with weather data.

“Then you can compare information and say, ‘My best year of yield was when I planted this date, this was the average temperature during pollination.’ You can derive that from all this weather information,” Senter says. “So, if I planted at this particular date with this particular variety, and I know the pollination date and what temperature I’m going to have this year, maybe this will help me generate better yield information so I can market better. It opens up a whole realm of possibilities when you are able to throw in more information to this.”

Exploring Virtual Reality

Another unique idea he’s using on the farm is virtual reality.

“I’m not really a gamer, because I’m sort of too old for that. But I was a gamer, and I’ve always had VR headsets,” says Senter.

He says he really likes Apple’s new VR technology called Apple Vision Pro , but prior to that, the other VR headsets available didn’t give him any “wow” factor.

“The Apple Vision Pro is amazing with what it can do,” says Senter. “When you put it on and get it calibrated to you, it’s extremely impressive how your eyes are basically your cursor. You just look at something in it, and you click your fingers together, and it works.”

More Apple Vision Pro. Currently it isn’t great for everyday use, but as things progress this type of augmented reality will be everywhere. #AppleVisionPro @JohnDeere pic.twitter.com/kYxMDs8qUG
— Travis Senter (@traviss22) April 28, 2024

He admits that VR headsets are bulky today. But in the future, he thinks the technology will be in a pair of sunglasses.

“If you imagine 10 years from now, this is going to be smaller, and when you’re walking in the field and see a weed, you can take a picture of it. You can enter that in ChatGPT, and you can ask what that weed is and how you can kill it. And it’ll tell you,” says Senter.

He says it’s a simple way to ask a question, and it’s one that won’t be judged.

“When I ask that question to a professor or a doctor, they may look down on me and think I should probably already know this, and maybe I should or maybe I forgot it. It doesn’t matter. But I get an answer from ChatGPT, and then I can follow it up with more questions. And when you think about that, it opens up a whole realm of possibilities.

Combing Through the Data

Even with those tools, it all goes back to data and capturing as much data as possible on every acre and with every pass. That’s what helps Senter solve some of the problems on his farm.

“If I look at a field and see a problem spot, I’ll instantly pull out my phone and figure out when we sprayed that and when that spot got missed, so I can come back and fix that,” says Senter. “I then know when the applicator missed it. I know what he missed doing, for example.”

Travis Senter checks his mobile app

(Mike Byers)

He says whether it’s when he’s spraying, planting or harvesting, he looks at the data every night, no matter the time of year.

“When I get home from work, I’ll probably spend two or three hours on a computer every night going through fields, looking at maps and just making sure everything got planted right or everything was sprayed right. And that’s usually why I do it,” says Senter.

In the fall, he says it may be midnight before he gets home, but he always goes through the data to make sure everyone is on the same page.

By carefully calculating every move on his farm, he’s controlling what he can control, instead of leaving it up to chance.

“We take every single truck across one scale, just that one scale. We record that information and I’ll enter that in some spreadsheets. I’ve tried different software companies, but Excel and Google Sheets are my saving grace from some of that,” says Senter. “I’ll enter all that information every single night after we get done, so I know exactly how much grain is in the field, and then I’ll send out a report the next day showing exactly how many acres we harvested, how much grain is in this bin and what their average moisture was. There’s lots of information that we try to keep up with.”

A Valuable Tool Today: John Deere Operations Center Mobile

One thing he’s excited to use this fall is something he suggested to John Deere in the past few years. Senter relies heavily on John Deere’s Operations Center Mobile app year-round. He says it’s extremely valuable to help him see real-time information, including fuel information.

What’s new this year is when Senter pulls into a field to harvest, the app will give him an estimated time of completion.

“It gives you a percentage of how much you have left, and what time you should be done. And it’s an adjustable scale,” he says. “I kept mentioning to Deere that we really need a way to know that information, just like when you go on a trip and use GPS for your trip, you know your ETA and you’re trying to beat that time of arrival. We try to beat that time to finish harvest. The app actually keeps everybody up to date of how much is left in that field.”

With that real-time information, Senter can be more strategic about when they finish a field and move to the next, making sure to miss heavy traffic times, like when school gets out in the afternoon. He says it’s a handy feature and one he’s excited to use this fall.

From the race track to the farm field, Senter knows the race to farm effectively and efficiently isn’t slowing down.

“I’m always learning. I’m always finding ways to integrate new things,” says Senter.

Watch the full feature on Senter and how he thinks about technology on the farm differently.

This Multistate Farmer Is Putting A Spotlight On Diversity In Agriculture

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 12:00:00 GMT

Ask PJ Haynie what keeps him motivated, and he’ll say it’s watching a crop grow. This dyed-in-the-wool farmer learned his vocation in life in the shadow of his father on a Virginia farm that was started by his great-great-grandfather.

It’s a story that could be like so many other father-son generational farming succession stories; however, Haynie is one of less than 10,000 Black, row-crop farmers in the U.S. today. He has had a unique, if not singular, set of challenges put forth in front of him yet he has found success on his own terms.

When opportunity intersects with Haynie’s optimism, sparks fly. For his achievements in farming, Haynie was named a Top Producer of the Year Finalist in 2024. The program is sponsored by BASF, Case IH, and Rabo AgriFinance.

Upon graduation from Virginia Tech University, Haynie boomeranged home to farm with his father (Philip J. Haynie II). But he wasn’t settled for long, and soon went to Mississippi and then to Arkansas to learn how to farm in the Mississippi Delta.

“Quite often when I meet the person sitting next to me on an airplane, they say I don’t look like a farmer. What is a farmer supposed to look like?” Haynie says. “I’ve been given a gift to show others and share with others. My work is to spotlight diversity in agriculture.”

Haynie says it’s his torch to carry and shine the light. While proud of being a fifth-generation farmer, he acknowledges a dark history his great-great-grandfather worked hard to leave behind. After being freed from slavery, he purchased 60 acres of land on Sept. 14, 1867, in Northumberland County, Va., ground the family still operates on today.

“I don’t want anyone to think Black farmers don’t have any of the same agronomic challenges white farmers have,” he says. “We have the same uncontrollables: weather, price, insects. It’s the historical inequities that create the economic disparities we are currently seeing.”

He points to statistics showing that in 1920, there were one million Black farmers in the U.S. compared to four million white farmers. In regard to Black land ownership, in 1920, Black people owned 16 million acres of land in the U.S. Currently, Black land ownership is less than two million acres.

Haynie has leaned into many opportunities to expand his family’s farming operation — both geographically and vertically.

“Mike Tyson famously said, ‘Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.’ And I would add Mother Nature has a powerful jab,” Haynie says.

“He looked up at me and said, ‘Son, I think this conversation is over.’” ~ PJ Haynie

(John David Pittman)

A Tenacious Advocate
When PJ Haynie returned home from college to farm full-time, he heard about the USDA Loans for Beginning Farmers and Ranchers, but he was immediately met with resistance from a USDA staff member.

“I asked the gentleman, ‘Why are you trying to discourage me? You know a friend of mine, and you gave him a beginning farm loan. Why are you discouraging me from getting involved in farming?” Haynie says. The conversation was getting a little elevated, and the USDA employee pulled his desk drawer open, and brandished a loaded pistol at Haynie.

“He looked at that pistol, looked at me and said, ‘Son, I think this conversation is over,’” Haynie recalls.

Haynie reflects on that story and many others of racial adversity that he has experienced over the years. An unwavering belief in his purpose and resolute perseverance have powered him through and above such discrimination and threats.

“Unfortunately, Black farmers are an endangered species,” Haynie says. “For us to make a difference, we have to protect the small herd of remaining Black farmers that exist and create opportunities for their children and grandchildren.”

In agriculture, we understand that land ownership creates generational wealth. That’s one of the missions of the National Black Growers Council, of which Haynie was a founding member in 2009.

“It’s important for people to understand history and the events that led to the current statistics of less than 10,000 Black row-crop farmers in the U.S.,” he says.

The 14 million acres of land Black Americans have lost over the past 100 years represents over $326 billion in wealth that was extracted from Black families.

“My family currently leases over 3,000 acres of Black-owned land,” Haynie says. “Growing up in Virginia, I never imagined that this was a possibility.”

Haynie just completed a two-year commitment on the USDA Equity Commission, which gave its final recommendations to USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack.

“If we don’t continue to keep our foot on the gas, Black row-crop farmers are going to be extinct,” Haynie says. “I’m hoping to do my part to help reverse that downward trend.”

He suggests for landowners who are beginning to wind down their farm operation to consider working with producers who have been historically underserved.

“The next generation will be grown from the seeds we plant,” Haynie says. “Unfortunately, the hands that grow the food we consume every day are not as diverse as the knees sitting under American dinner tables. We need to create more opportunities for the few remaining Black farm families. Every morning, I wake up with the weight of helping to prevent further Black land loss and additional Black farmers from going out of business.“

PJ Haynie says expanding their farm to two locations 1,000 miles apart was a leap of faith, but one that has grown their farm, expanded his network and driven him to find further purpose.

(John David Pittman)

Geographic Leap of Faith
It was Mother Nature who opened Haynie’s eyes to expanding to the Mississippi Delta. Seeking to gain further efficiencies, and with limited geographic expansion opportunities available in Virginia, Haynie looked south, to where he could truck equipment to and plant a month earlier.

“The stretch of coming to the Delta caused growing pains; it was like our waistline got bigger but the pants stayed the same size,” he says. “We now farm ground that’s 1,000 miles or 16 hours apart. In farming, it’s not how big your belt buckle is or how shiny your truck is; it’s the happiness you have in what you do.”

Motivated to Lead
In learning from his father’s success, Haynie picked up one key attribute: the ability to motivate people.

“With our team on the farm, it’s about building respect and rapport, leading by example,” Haynie says.

He readily admits there’s no textbook for what he’s learned in farming; the process of trial and error has taught him many things to share. On any given day, his call log is likely maxed out — displaying 100 calls — by lunchtime.

“We like to quarterback everything,” Haynie says. “So, for example, if we’ve got men working on the east side of the farm, they can call a ‘runner’ for tools or diesel or whatever they need. That keeps focus on the most important task,” he says.

Much of his role is reacting as the day unfolds. But with a long-term view, Haynie is focused on giving opportunity across his team.

“When a young man comes to work on our farm, my goal is to motivate him beyond what he sees in himself and help him reach his maximum potential,” he says. “If I don’t achieve that, then I feel I’ve failed.”

With limited places to grow in Virginia, Haynie saw opportunity to expand his operation into Arkansas — where he could start working ground a month sooner.

(John David Pittman)

Seeds to Grow
As a farmer, Haynie learned new production practices: irrigation techniques, farming on raised beds and more, but he also formed an important camaraderie with other farmers.

“It has been incredibly valuable to look beyond my local community and the four counties I farmed in. When I came home from Virginia Tech in 1999, if you told me you’d give me $1,000 for every Black farmer I knew who was farming over 1,000 acres, I wouldn’t have been able to cash a check,” he says. “And then I started farming in the Delta, and I found many more Black farmers who I could build a network with and share stories unlike anything I had found before.”

As an extension of this informal fraternity, a nonprofit organization called the National Black Growers Council was formed in 2009. Haynie serves as chairman of the board.

“Your network is your net worth,” he says. “I used to despise parking my tractor to attend meetings. But I realized, who else better to tell PJ’s story than PJ? To be a consistent advocate, I need to engage and share why we do and how we do.”

Haynie credits his father for encouraging him to expand the farming operation and try new agronomic practices. One example is growing canola in 2015, and then transitioning to rapeseed after a few years.

“I have learned to turn stumbling blocks to stepping stones.” Haynie says.

As he started farming in Arkansas, Haynie introduced new crops to the business, including rice, which opened another door. In 2020, he became co-owner of the first Black-owned, food-grade certified rice mill in the U.S., which is located in Pine Bluff, Ark.

“Rice is only grown in six states, and Arkansas is the No. 1 rice producing state in the country,” Haynie says.

In 2020, when Haynie and his partner acquired the rice mill, there were approximately 50 rice mills in the U.S., and none were Black owned.

“As a commodity farmer, no matter how much corn or beans I grow, you can’t directly take that home and feed it to your family,” he says. “The rice really allows us to grow a product, process it at our facility, and offer that to you to take home and feed your family.”

Haynie says the advantages of vertical expansion are both economic — capturing more value in the processing chain — and family-based. The rice mill provides an opportunity for the entire family to contribute. From his son completing a summer internship at the rice mill to a sister that provides financial oversight, each member of the family contributes in their own way.

Three words are interlocking links in Haynie’s life: faith, farming and family.

“My four sisters and I were all pushed to go to college and get an education because of our family values,” Haynie says. “We knew the foundation of education can never be taken away from us, and we just wanted to be able to bring our skills back to the family business to help it to grow.”

In what Haynie described as a “happy day” was a time he was on the farm in Arkansas and received a FaceTime call from his daughter back in Virginia operating a tractor during her college break.

“Farming is a joy, and it’s a privilege. My family legacy is rooted in it, and it’s been my mission to raise my children with the same work ethic that my family instilled in me,” Haynie says.

Haynie Farms’ Business Details

(John David Pittman)

Next Gen Farmer In Arkansas Recasts The Future

Fri, 07 Jun 2024 01:44:04 GMT

The week of June 10, Farm Journal is celebrating the next generation of American agriculture. Our goal is to encourage you to plan for the future and cultivate multigenerational success through the transfer of skills and knowledge. Think tomorrow, act today to align your asset, resource and financial legacy.

In the heart of the Arkansas delta, Hallie Shoffner has a legacy to uphold. As a sixth-generation farmer in a town incorporated by her ancestors, she’s spent the past five years working to sustain and grow her family’s farm business.

“Farming is more difficult now, especially for young farmers,” Shoffner says. “I want to leave my son a future that isn’t plagued by market volatility, climate change, inflation, health issues or pandemics.”

Shoffner took over SFR Seed, a 2,000-acre research operation located in Newport, Ark., in 2019. The business includes seed stock production for 20 varieties of specialty rice, pre-commercial soybean research and commercial grains. But coming back to the farm wasn’t always part of the plan.

“My parents were very intentional about making me leave the farm. They wanted me to experience other things, and so did I,” Shoffner says. “When I got my master’s degree, I tried a lot of different things and hated all of them. I don’t like sitting behind a desk. I want to see the fruits of my labor — quite literally.”

Shoffner spent years traveling the globe in search of what would fulfill her, eventually finding it in an unlikely place.

“I spent time in Peru in the Amazon jungle working for a nonprofit that spoke with women about health issues, domestic violence and childcare,” she says. “They had programs where they helped the women start farms, so I was able to visit all of them and help harvest their crops. That was my favorite thing I did.”

Looking back on that experience, Shoffner realizes it shouldn’t have been surprising her other career paths didn’t bring her joy. She belonged on the farm.

Hear Hallie on The Top Producer Podcast

Use Niches As A Springboard

Shoffner was handed the CEO baton from her mother, Wendy, and is now working to stay ahead of the game while making the operation her own. One strategy that’s allowed her to do both is diversification with specialty rice.

“There are not many specialty rice acres in the south, and we’re the only company in the entire world that maintains about seven of these lines,” Shoffner says.

With so many achievements as an entrepreneur and business manager in the short time following her return to the farm, Shoffner has been recognized with the 2024 Top Producer of the Year Next Gen Award, sponsored by Pioneer and Fendt. And as she continues to move the operation forward, her long-term dream is to move its focus into even more niche areas.

In Newport, Ark., Hallie Shoffner is focused on potential at her 2,000-acre operation, SFR Seed, a family business specializing in seed production and research. Shoffner is carrying on a mission her mother began in 1988. At the 2024 Top Producer Summit, Shoffner received the Next Gen Award, sponsored by Pioneer and Fendt.

“I think the future of farming, especially in the South, is in specialty crops. Right now, it’s hard to be profitable in commodities,” she says. “I like specialty rice because we get a premium on it, and I don’t have the same thing every year. But I love to grow weird things — I would love to try cow peas, and I really would like to try peanuts.”

One to face challenges head-on, Shoffner wants to build resiliency in her farm business.

“The way my parents farmed was that in the good years, you do what you can to put away money to preserve your equity and be prepared for the bad years,” Shoffner says. “But what happens when you have more bad years than not? When they become more frequent and you have more crop loss, or more market volatility due to changing weather patterns?”

Since Shoffner took over the operation, she says there has been some form of extreme weather event every year. From an abnormally wet spring delaying planting to a massive drought causing an emergency situation in the state to working fields in a heat index of 120°F.

“Farming changes so rapidly. You have to be able to adapt and you have to be flexible. You have to understand that the decision you made yesterday may be a completely different decision you make 12 months from now,” she says. “You have to be willing to change the way you look at things.”

It’s with those ever-changing conditions in mind she’s been working to implement as many climate-smart practices as possible while also balancing what’s practical.

“It’s great to help the environment, but it’s also great to help my bottom line by saving money,” she says. “There are not that many farmers left, and those of us still here are trying to do the right thing. Not just for the environment but for our own financial sustainability.”

Some of the practices SFR Seed has implemented include converting wells from diesel to electric power to save water, switching to conservation tillage, replacing a portion of fertilizer with chicken litter and cover cropping.

Trial And Error

Along her operation’s conservation journey, Shoffner has learned sustainability can’t be a one-size-fits-all solution.

“We do a lot of trialing before we adopt something, and I think conservation is all about trial and error for farmers,” Shoffner says. “Nothing has been easy to implement, and there are some fields where the conservation tillage is great, but I might have another field where I say reducing synthetic fertilizer is better. Maybe next year, using a drone to spray and save on herbicides and fuel will be my favorite.”

This is a reality Shoffner believes is important for other young producers to recognize.

“It’s about practical innovations,” she says. “You can implement some of these practices, but you don’t have to feel like you need 100% of them. Be true to your farm; they’re all different.”

As Shoffner has experienced her fair share of problems along this process, including a cover crop turned weed in one field, she has also realized how important it is for members of the ag industry to be more transparent with consumers about the challenges they’re up against.

Hallie’s Favorite Things
On top of her work at SFR Seed, Shoffner recently launched a new company, Foodwise, that combines her passions for diversification, climate change and female farmers into one project. The mission of Foodwise is to market specialty rice varieties grown in the South by women and minority farmers to brands and ask them to do pilot programs for production. “There are huge brands that buy rice for pet food products, parboiled products or sell to restaurants. We know there are varieties grown here that can meet their needs,” Shoffner says. “We market our varieties to those brands and say, ‘If you want to diversify your sourcing, we can help.’” For the brands, the reward is twofold. The rice provides a potentially lower carbon footprint because it doesn’t need to be imported and helps meet diversity goals. “It’s climate friendly, it’s grown by diverse farmers, and it’s something consumers can feel good about buying,” Shoffner says. “We don’t have control over a lot of things, but we do have control over our ability to diversify and let food companies know the South is a viable source of specialty products.”

Hallie’s Favorite Things

On top of her work at SFR Seed, Shoffner recently launched a new company, Foodwise, that combines her passions for diversification, climate change and female farmers into one project.

The mission of Foodwise is to market specialty rice varieties grown in the South by women and minority farmers to brands and ask them to do pilot programs for production.

“There are huge brands that buy rice for pet food products, parboiled products or sell to restaurants. We know there are varieties grown here that can meet their needs,” Shoffner says. “We market our varieties to those brands and say, ‘If you want to diversify your sourcing, we can help.’”

For the brands, the reward is twofold. The rice provides a potentially lower carbon footprint because it doesn’t need to be imported and helps meet diversity goals.

“It’s climate friendly, it’s grown by diverse farmers, and it’s something consumers can feel good about buying,” Shoffner says. “We don’t have control over a lot of things, but we do have control over our ability to diversify and let food companies know the South is a viable source of specialty products.”

Voice The Challenges

“I try to talk to as many consumers as I can about what it means to be a farmer in the face of climate change and in the face of market volatility, but I really like to talk about the practical application of conservation techniques,” she says. “There are advocates out there closing their ears to the true challenges of implementing conservation practices. They say, ‘You shouldn’t use Roundup, because it’s killing everything.’ Well, we should be using less Roundup, but here’s why that’s hard, here’s what we’re doing to reduce our usage.”

Over the years, Shoffner has also gotten involved with organizations such as AgLaunch, Presidential Scholars, and the Arkansas Food Bank to broaden her network and find more ways to serve as an advocate for agriculture and climate change.

The Next Generation

Shoffner says her passion for speaking up about her experience with a changing climate came partially from seeing her parents as active advocates in the ag industry growing up, partially from being opinionated and partially from anxiety.

“Being a young farmer, I started to have a lot more anxiety about the future when I came back to the farm,” she says. “As it’s leader, I have to think about how I’ll keep this afloat for another 30 to 40 years when I don’t even know how the industry will look 12 months from now.”

Words of wisdom from her dad, John, are something she can count on to put her feelings in check.

“My dad is always saying, ‘Don’t worry about it. It’s not the end of the world.’ He’s right. It’s not,” Shoffner says. “We have a tall rice variety that will get blown over with the slightest wind at harvest. I remember looking out the window during a big storm saying, ‘It’s all going to fall over, it’ll be ruined.’ And he said, ‘If it falls over, you’ll deal with it. It won’t be the end of the world, though.’ And he was right.”

If given a magic wand, Shoffner says she would use it to be more aware of her stress levels and how much of it is self-imposed.

“I do think women struggle more with this because on top of being farmers, many of us are also mothers,” she says. “We do a lot of emotional work in the house, we’re more cognizant of interoffice communication and relationships, and then we also do a lot of the physical labor.”

But even with the mental toll it comes with, there’s still nothing she’d rather be than a young, female farmer.

“Millennial farmers are very innovative. We’re very willing to try new things — new, weird things. We’re motivated to not just change the way we farm but to change our economic systems,” Shoffner says. “And as a woman farmer, I’m part of a group with backbones made of steel like my mom’s.”

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Stunning Collection of 50,000 Farmland Marbles Began With 12 Boxes of Stolen Arrowheads

Fri, 24 May 2024 18:56:30 GMT

How did 12 boxes of superb arrowheads stolen from beneath a boy’s bed lead to the greatest collection of farmland marbles ever gathered?

Welcome to Wyman Atwood’s unlikely tale of obsession, deceit, and an astounding 50,000-marble haul.

Cottonmouth

In 1963, Wyman Atwood was born to cotton in Greene County, Arkansas, a stone’s throw from the Missouri Bootheel. Along Highway 49, outside the tiny town of Marmaduke, Atwood was raised on level land roughly 5 miles from Crowley’s Ridge, a geologic spine rising 250’ above the flats, running nearly unbroken for 200 miles from southeast Missouri to Arkansas’s Phillips County, and a sustained haunt of Native Americans for millennia.

Atwood’s grandfather, John Henry, spilled out of Kentucky in roughly 1900 and bought timberland outside Marmaduke. He cleared old-growth hardwood on 1,000 acres. “Our farmland had heavy Indian presence,” Atwood recalls. “When my grandfather was cutting trees, he uncovered so many stone tools that he’d carry the big ones to a fence line and drop them, just to get rid of the nuisance of rocks in the field.”

Atwood’s father, Earl, inherited the farm reins. In 1969, he bought his 5-year-old son a motorbike and loosed the boy on rough-and-tumble adventure. “Redneck kid on a Honda 50,” Atwood says. “I rode to ditches and sloughs all day and found fun. In a couple more years, from the moment my toes could push in a tractor or truck clutch, I was operating farm machinery.”

In 1979, an elderly farming neighbor introduced Atwood to a modest arrowhead collection—all pieces collected within a mile radius. Atwood went straight to his own farm and began walking rows. He hit a motherlode in a mere afternoon of searching: An inordinate amount of Native American points atop family dirt that had never been previously picked.

Shortness of breath; rush of blood; cottonmouth; and an uncanny sixth sense. Arrowhead fever roared through Atwood, and he welcomed the disease. Every waking hour of opportunity, he was a shadow in the spring or winter fields, marching the rows and finding absolute treasures: abundant Hardin and Dalton specimens—prehistoric points often in fantastic condition.

“I was hard core. There were days when I went out and filled a pocket in 30 minutes with beauties,” he explains. “No doubt our land was home to Indians for thousands of years. My hunting got to the stage where if a point wasn’t in great condition, I’d leave it right there in the field. It’s fair to say that I became obsessed. I didn’t care if they were worth anything. All I cared about was finding them for their own history and wonder.”

Within several years, Atwood amassed a phenomenal collection as the sole hunter on an arrowhead Shangri-La. He slept atop his most prize pieces, filling a dozen shoeboxes to the brim with tools magnificently crafted from jasper, flint, chert, quartzite, greenstone, and more. The boxes, lined head to toe down the side of Atwood’s bed, were a virtual museum.

“For a boy on a farm, life was so sweet,” he recalls. “Hunting those arrowheads became part of me and made things even sweeter.”

The sweet was about to go bitter.

Wink of Fate

The family farmhouse sat alone—always unlocked. Atwood and Earl typically worked minutes away, darting in and out to eat, use the phone, or grab a necessity.

In 1983, Atwood’s first cousin, likewise an avid arrowhead hunter, visited from Florida. Excited by the arrival of his relative, Atwood dashed to his bedroom, anxious to show off the collection of smokers.

Dropping to his knees, Atwood reached under the bed and pulled out a shoebox with no heft. Empty.

Down the line Atwood went, sliding out the boxes. Empty.

The twelfth box, the last in line, curiously was still full.

Time slowed down as the violation washed over Atwood. “I figured someone dumped all the boxes into a bag and maybe ran out of time on the last box. To this day, about 40 years later, I don’t know who stole my arrowheads and I couldn’t prove a thing,” he explains.

“I’ll never, never forget the feeling of realizing someone had stolen my arrowheads right from my own room in my own house—someone that had to be very close to me because it was an inside job.”

“It’s hard to put into words, but my arrowhead fuse was burnt from that day on. I’d still walk the rows sometimes, but my love of hunting points was never the same. It kind of died.”

Enter a wink of fate and Bertis Walker, the marble maestro.

Hooked

Well over a decade past the theft, Atwood was struck by the charms of Tanginna Walker, and fell in with her father, Bertis, a Greene County farmer who became more of a brother, rather than a father-in-law. The pair of men were inseparable. Find one, find the other, in a chain of hunting, fishing, riding gravel, and marbling.

Marbling?

Walker, whether by fixation or pure passion, was in the process of amassing a lifetime assemblage of tens of thousands of marbles plucked from farmland and old house sites.

Rekindling the collecting fires, Walker became Atwood’s marble mentor, patiently poring through the pages of marble collecting books, teaching Atwood marble history, type, rarity, origin, dates, and more. Atwood contracted a double-portion of the marble virus racing through Walker’s veins.

“I got hooked on marbles,” Atwood recalls. “I’d be in the rows looking any chance I got, going with Tanginna or going alone. Pretty soon, those marbles started adding up.”

Sincerely. But why are tiny, colored spheres—children’s toys—scattered in volume on farmland?

Keepsies

Before the advent of modern agriculture machinery, farmland was dotted with homes. “Every 40 acres or so had at least one house and some farms had clusters of sharecropper houses,” Atwood says. “When you look out today and see empty land, it might not have looked that way just 50 years ago or more.”

Within a given geography, for example, where timber was cleared in the late 1800s, and tenant families moved on and off the ground until the 1960s, scores of children spread across generations were associated with a particular shotgun or dog trot house, i.e., the actors changed, but the stage remained the same.

All those kids, regardless of family income level, possessed the ubiquity of childhood: marbles. In an age prior to television access, and decades before home computers, video games, the internet, or iPhones, kids shot marbles for keepsies in front or back yards, in barn dirt, under porches, and beneath shade trees.

Affordably priced, depending on the decade, at 5 cents to 20 cents per bag at general stores and commissaries, or acquired via giveaways at service stations and shoe stores, marbles were the great equalizer of childhood. Some kids had a little; most had a lot.

“I think all the time about the kids who owned these marbles I find,” Atwood says. “Many of those kids didn’t have too many other possessions besides those marbles and that makes me sincerely grateful for the blessings I’ve been given in life.”

The kids are gone. The houses are gone. The marbles remain. Agates, alabasters, cat-eyes, clays, glazed clays, and more, the marbles of yesterday hide under the dirt—waiting patiently to reveal their color and join the 50,000-strong collection of Wyman Atwood.

Past to Present

Whether climbing in a side-by-side for a short ride to a nearby house site, or driving a truck to more distant locations, Atwood’s blood pumps hard. “On my way to a hunt, I’m full of anticipation, not sure what I’ll find in the sandy dirt. Once I hit the rows, I go into deep concentration and leave the world behind. It’s all about the hunt—finding is just the temporary reward.”

“It’s a unique feeling where I think about good times gone by and great friends of my past, and it makes me appreciate what I have now,” he notes. “There is much more going on in those rows than nostalgia. I’ll have a talk with Jesus when I’m walking and I’ll know that’s right where I need to be.”

With every marble spotted against the mocha soil, Atwood bends over, pulls the sphere out of the past, and gently tucks it into a front pocket. “I love marbles as a hobby and I’ll buy some special ones from time to time, but the ones that matter are those that come out of the fields. Chipped or cracked or even crushed—it makes me no difference. I could care less about the value of the objects I find.”

But what if the value of the object is $15,000—cash on the barrelhead?

No Means No

On April 18, 1991, several years past the heartache of bedroom theft, Atwood walked into a field with random hopes—coins, bear teeth, clay pipe stems, or whatever curios the rows might offer. Minutes into the hunt, Atwood spotted a wide base sticking up from the sandy dirt. He pulled; the point didn’t budge. He wiggled; the point gave the barest sway. He pulled again; 4.5” of a knobbed Hardin slid from the soil and saw sunlight for the first time in several thousand years. A stunner.

Atwood knelt beside an adjacent gar hole and washed away dirt from the serrations, shocked by the quality of the smoker. Forgoing the relative safety of his own pocket, he kept the soft flesh of his hand clasped tightly around the Hardin and made for home, where he immediately deposited it into a foam-lined case.

Word travels fast. The next morning, to Atwood’s surprise, he heard a knock on his front door.

“There was this doctor on my steps from in town that was well-known to buy arrowheads,” Atwood details. “He said, ‘I want to see that arrowhead you found.’”

Atwood retrieved the case and pointed at the Hardin, declining to remove the piece. The doctor took one look and fingered a knot of hundred-dollar bills: “I want that arrowhead.”

“Not for sale,” Atwood answered.

The doctor peeled off 30 bills—$3,000—and placed them on a table.

“No, sir. Not for sale,” Atwood reiterated.

“I’ll be back. I’ll be right back,” responded the doctor, confident in tone.

True to his word, the doctor returned in 20 minutes with a bulkier knot.

“He slapped down $6,000, and I said, ‘No,’ again,” Atwood recalls. “He went right up to $10,000, and I told him politely, ‘No means no.’”

Three days later, Atwood again heard a knock at the door. The doctor was back with $15,000 in cash. Atwood turned it down.

“Everybody told me I was stupid,” Atwood laughs. “I may be stupid, but I told that man the arrowhead was special. I told him I was supposed to find it and it wasn’t for sale. End of story.”

“It’s true that I’m crazy, but it’s also true that I’m the guy who loves what he finds for the story of it.”

Uncovered

Atwood has lost count.

At a total between 50,000 and 75,000, his marbles rest in foam-bottom display cases, glass lamps, countless jars, and an end table with a clear top.

“It’s not about the numbers and it’s not about the value,” Atwood emphasizes. “We’ll pass these marbles on to our grandkids and they can do what they want.”

Beyond marbles or arrowheads, he urges others to foster outdoor interests of any type. “Take your kids and grandkids outside at every opportunity. Get them off the television and phone. If you spend time with them outside, then they’ll take an interest in nature or history or something, and that’s when you praise them, to help build that interest.”

Expect Atwood to stay on the hunt, patiently adding to his marble mountain.

“Life took me from arrowheads to marbles, and there’s so much in our dirt still to be uncovered,” Atwood adds. “It’s coming to the top and I want to be there when it pops out.”

For more articles from Chris Bennett ( cbennett@farmjournal.com or 662-592-1106), see:

Power vs. Privacy: Landowner Sues Game Wardens, Challenges Property Intrusion

Corn and Cocaine: Roger Reaves and the Most Incredible Farm Story Never Told

American Gothic: Farm Couple Nailed In Massive $9M Crop Insurance Fraud

Priceless Pistol Found After Decades Lost in Farmhouse Attic

Cottonmouth Farmer: The Insane Tale of a Buck-Wild Scheme to Corner the Snake Venom Market

Tractorcade: How an Epic Convoy and Legendary Farmer Army Shook Washington, D.C.

Bizarre Mystery of Mummified Coon Dog Solved After 40 Years

While America Slept, China Stole the Farm

2024 Top Producer Next Gen Award Winner: Finding Opportunities Between the Rows

Fri, 23 Feb 2024 23:02:44 GMT

The work never stops, even if the machines do.

In Newport, Ark., Hallie Shoffner is focused on potential at her 2,000-acre operation, SFR Seed, a family business specializing in seed production and research. Shoffner is carrying on a mission her mother began in 1988.

“She trained me in how to increase pure seed stock of soybeans and rice, and it’s been a journey of me learning what she did, and then adopting new practices in the field, particularly in terms of rice work,” says Hallie Shoffner, Top Producer of the Year Next Gen Award winner, sponsored by Pioneer and Fendt.

It is somewhat of a new practice for the operation, but they now grow and maintain about 20 different rice varieties in partnership with USDA.

“We’ve been very lucky to have them helping us out in the field, so that we can build our own rice purity program,” Shoffner says.

Shoffner was raised in these fields and spent her childhood between the rows.

“When I was little, my mom gave me an option. She said, ‘You can go to church with your grandmother, or you can go scout cotton with your dad,’” Shoffner says. “And that, as a kid, that’s an easy choice, right? Because he would take me to McDonald’s, and we’d go, which he still does today. We’d stop, and he’d say, ‘Go pick me 100 squares.’ And so we’d go out, we’d pick them, bring them back to the tailgate, open them up, look for bugs, and those are some of my best memories with my dad.”

After college, encouraged to get out of ag, Shoffner lived all over the world: from Nashville to India, to Seattle, to Arkansas, then on to Peru and Spain.

“I tried a lot of different things,” Shoffner says. “I tried grant writing, I tried nonprofit work, I tried marketing, and I really didn’t find anywhere where I fit in.”

But agriculture was calling.

“My dad needed to retire because he got his dementia diagnosis,” Shoffner says. “And they said, you can come back if you want. If you don’t, we’ll just shut it down. And I thought no, please don’t do that.”

Working and training with her mother, in 2019 Shoffner took the lead as CEO and continues to focus on growing the business, searching for opportunities in specialty crops and value-added production.

“In the Delta, we’re so focused on commodities, we’re so focused on volume that we kind of lose perspective on the specialty work,” Shoffner says. “And there is a push now, knowing that the Delta has water, and places like California do not, there’s going to be a big push for specialty work here in the south.”

Shoffner is also focusing her energy on sustainability.

“I’ve seen the pressures that climate change puts on farmers, we have had either income or crop loss due to extreme weather events that are becoming consistently more inconsistent,” she says.

It’s a message and a call to action she is passionate about sharing.

“Farmers are doing their part to combat the 10% carbon emissions that we are contributing to greenhouse gases,” Shoffner says. “We need support from other industries. If we’re making the investments to go to no-till, if we’re making the investments in technology that we need to become more environmentally sustainable, other industries need to do so as well.”
This includes building a future together that makes the most of modern gene editing tools and technology.

“We can use technology to create plants that are hardier in the face of climate change, that yield better, that are disease resistant,” she says. “I think that’s the future, and we are going to become involved in a big way.

Shoffner takes this cause seriously because she has already reaped benefits from the past.

“I’m extremely privileged; I come from a long history of farming,” Shoffner says. “I’m a sixth-generation farmer. I will inherit land that’s been in our family for over 100 years. A path has been paved for me; it’s my responsibility to do the best with it that I can.”

It’s a mission she learned from the days in the field with her father and from watching her mother, the scientist.

“I watched her walk confidently into every room and speak her mind; she was the expert,” Shoffner says. “And I knew that I could do anything because I saw her do anything.”

Shoffner pours confidence and precision into every day as she works to carry on a legacy of innovation.

“I’m proud to be a farmer,” she says. “Like I said, farmers are the ultimate innovators. We have been since the agricultural revolution 10,000 years ago, and I am proud to be a part of that generation.”

2024 Top Producer of the Year Finalist PJ Haynie: Advocacy And Tenacity

Fri, 09 Feb 2024 18:39:35 GMT

No step is too big for Top Producer finalist, PJ Haynie. Deep family roots are the foundation of his farming legacy.

“My family lineage dates back to my great-great-grandfather, who was the first African American to come out of slavery and purchase 60 acres of land on Sept. 14, 1867, in Northumberland County, Virginia,” Haynie says.

Today, his family still owns and operates a portion of that land, which is now spread across four counties in the northern neck of Virginia and near the Chesapeake Bay. His accomplishments led to be named a finalist for Top Producer of the Year, which is sponsored by BASF, Case IH, and Rabo Agrifinance.

“I spent a lot of time with my dad, and I was his walking shadow,” Haynie says. “And I tell folks that my dad tricked me into farming, you know, as I was on the floor, carpet farming with my toys, I matriculated to the bigger toys, the real ones.”

He started driving at age seven and by 10 replaced a 40-year-old hired hand. After graduating from Virgina Tech, Haynie returned to the family operation looking to build a future with a focus on technology and improving efficiency.

“Instead of planting from sunup to sundown, dad would say, ‘Hey, you can take that bubble on that roof, and you can work half the night, can’t you?’ And I said, ‘Yeah.’ So, he said, ‘I will get you into big fields, so you can work the night, and that way, you know, it increased our productivity with the equipment by being able to work longer days and longer hours,” Haynie says.

Today, as one of five kids, he and his four sisters still work together on the farm. But in 2010, while helping start and run a nonprofit called the National Black Growers Council, Haynie found himself in the Arkansas Delta.

He tells the story of how he and his father thought about the expansion.

“If we had a farm down south, we could probably start planting three to four weeks before we start here in Virginia,” Haynie says. “And with the equipment, we have our own trucks, let’s haul a tractor and a planter down and some equipment down, get it done, and then bring it back up to Virginia to spread the cost of that equipment over more acres.”

Sixteen hours and a thousand miles from home, Haynie went to work, building a satellite operation in Phillips County Arkansas, roughly 25 miles west of the Mississippi River.

“Here in the Delta, we have a lot of flat land,” he says. “And that’s a little different than the landscape in Virginia.”

No rolling hills and natural drainage, instead Haynie’s learning to plant on raised beds and furrow irrigate. It also opened the door to his newest endeavor: restarting an abandoned rice mill.

“When we went to this facility, we saw a diamond in the rough; we saw an opportunity,” he says. “A state-of-the-art facility that was constructed brand new in 2016 that had close to 4,000-bu. storage capacity and the milling capacity. They processed about 22 metric tons of rice per hour.”

Today, he’s running the nation’s only Black-owned rice mill.

“As a commodity farmer, no matter how much corn or wheat or soybeans that I grow that are for feed, you can’t directly take that home and feed it to your family,” Haynie says.

And thanks to new USAID contracts, he’s helping feed the world. It’s a mission he takes seriously as a farmer and a member of the Black row-crop farming community.

“You know, in 1920, there were a million Black farmers in this country, and African Americans owned 16 million acres of land. Present day, there are less than 15,000 Black row crop farmers, and less than 2 million acres of Black-owned land. And if we don’t continue to keep our foot on the gas, Black men and women in row crop production agriculture are going to be extinct.”

It’s a mission he’s working to fulfill every day.

“I’m hoping that my interest in my advocacy work, will show others in the country and other young men, who I was in their shoes one day, that through hard work and tenacity and faith, the opportunities can come your way,” he says.

Congratulations to PJ Haynie, a finalist for the 2024 Top Producer of the year.

Ring Camera Captures Video Of Farmer's Close Call With Lightning

Fri, 16 Jun 2023 18:03:50 GMT

Lightning is five times hotter than the surface of the sun. It strikes 8.6 million times a day and is one of the most powerful forces nature has to offer. This past week, one Arkansas farmer had a close encounter with lightning, one that was caught on camera.

Clay Smith lives and farms in northeast Arkansas. Storms rolled through on Wednesday morning, and what happened as he was on his front porch is an experience Smith will never forget.

Thought it was a good time to spray those mosquitos @ryanvaughan @weatherchannel ⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️ pic.twitter.com/Iz9dJdMDcV
— Clay Smith (@CsmithFarms1) June 14, 2023

Smith posted the video from his Ring security camera on Twitter. As you can see, the lightning struck a tree in his front yard, and the loud crash clearly startled Smith. It was so loud he knew the lightning was close.

“The lightning rang my ears like a gun going off,” Smith says.

As you can see in the video, Smith hurried to the garage after the lightning struck.

“I can’t believe the Ring camera caught it on video,” Smith says. “The funny thing is my wife was in the living room watching it, too, so we both saw it and got a video.”

pic.twitter.com/9pO5cDCoWz
— Clay Smith (@CsmithFarms1) June 14, 2023

After the storm passed, he went out to assess the damage, showing a clear lightning strike on the tree in his front yard.

“I bet that oak tree is 150 years old,” Smith says. “I hope it makes it through and survives. I keep telling everyone that’s the only reason I bought the property.”

Smith says the storm did bring hail, which damaged crops 20 miles north of where he lives in Walcott, Ark., which is near Jonesboro. He says they were dry in the spring, and all the crops were planted early. They’ve had a few strong storms, but otherwise, that area is all irrigated and the crops are growing ahead of schedule.

Missouri Hopes To Terminate Dicamba Ban By End Of The Week

Tue, 17 Nov 2020 04:11:32 GMT

Arkansas farmers are waking up Tuesday morning to the first hours of the 120-day dicamba ban that went into effect overnight. Missouri farmers are on hold, and some are hoping the state ban is short-lived.

Missouri is the second state to halt the sales and use of dicamba this year. Chris Chinn, director of the Missouri Department of Agriculture, made the announcement Friday. On AgriTalk Monday, she said the department’s intentions for the ban is to be more of a short pause to get approved dicamba products back in the hands of farmers by the end of the week.

Chinn says that decision rides on companies like BASF AND Monsanto changing the restrictions or the label of the product.

“We’re looking at the special local needs label and that is the state label,” said Chinn. “Once my director for the Bureau of Pesticides Control signs off on that, it will go into effect immediately. It’ll then go up to the EPA, and the EPA has 90 days whether to offer their approval or ask for changes.”

In response, BASF issued a statement saying since it is a critical point in the season, “we have already proposed the text of such a label to Missouri, according to their direction.”

Monsanto released a statement as well, saying the company is working with Missouri and is “hopeful we will be able to reach a resolution on this matter in very short order.”

More than 130 damage complaints, totaling more than 200,000 acres of injured soybeans, have been filed with the Missouri Department of Agriculture. Kevin Bradley, weed specialist with the University of Missouri, said the majority of those complaints are concentrated to the Bootheel.

The damage can be attributed to several reasons including drift, spraying at night, use of generics and tank contamination, according to Bradley.

Drift is occurring from not only off-label products, but also from products approved for in-season use, including Engenia and XtendiMax.