Next-Generation Farmers
At the age of 15, Callee Pellett signed her first lease, and today, the 16-year-old farmer has nearly 20 acres she farms on her own. As the seventh generation, it’s a unique opportunity she doesn’t take for granted.
With a slogan of “raised, not sourced,” Tim Haer had a wild idea to differentiate their business: create a vending machine to sell meat produced on their family’s farm, an idea he says that’s been wildly successful.
As Mary Pat Sass’ social media shows glimpses of life from the seat of the tractor, it’s not the view she envisioned for her life even a decade ago. But through humor and candor, she’s now an inspiration to others.
Travel to Carpenter, Wy., and you’ll see two-thirds of the state’s 9,000 dairy cows, who are milked at Burnett Dairy. You’ll also get to see an upcoming second-generation dairy farmer, Reese Burnett.
Three under-30 producers from Illinois, Ohio and Mississippi sound off on the struggles, pressures and hopes of farming’s next generation.
In just a decade on the farm, Virginia dairy farmer Ben Smith’s journey has been one of dedication and innovation, which is what makes him the 2023 Milk Business Young Producer Award winner.
For the Gruhlkey family, farming thousands of irrigated acres in two states and eight counties is the easy part.
Indiana farmer finds a non-family heir for his farm business.
The shotgun houses and clapboard shacks are gone, but a child’s toy lingers in farmland rows. Time, tillage and rainfall reveal the sharecropper’s last testament: clusters of magnificent clay, agate and glass marbles.
The life of a tenacious young man was cut short by an undiagnosed virus