Here we go! We will be leaving for this trip in a little over a week and I could not be more excited. As I think about this trip I compare what I know as agriculture to what I am expecting agriculture to be like in the Midwest. I have grown up and worked on my family’s farm where we farm about 500 acres of grass seed. We are a very small operation; between my dad and mom, my two sisters, myself, and two paid employees, we get it done. Between us seven people, we have operators for a swather, combine, rake, baler, stacker, seed truck driver, and a truck driver to haul straw. It’s not always easy but we make it work and this has been my reality of agriculture.
When I think about agriculture in the Midwest, the first thing that comes to my mind is corn. From talking about this trip, I learned that there is a very large swine operation in the Midwest that we will be visiting as well as animal feed companies such as Purina. I am very excited to see large operations that are the top of the industry; what I know is more of a jack-of-all-trades-but-master-of-none type environment so I am very interested in how the professionals run their businesses.