Feeding the World: a New Generation

To start with this blog I do not to travel far: a visit at my neighbors, only three miles away. (Okay, in this part of South Dakota, anyone within 6 miles/10 km is considered a neighbor...) A short drive over a gravel road between green hayfields and dark, newly planted fields.
It is a perfect spring morning to meet outside the farm buildings with Tom and Lexy Koch, and their children Leya and Jas. Leya is playing with a tractor, and Jas is crawling around us, playing with a dandelion.
Tom has farmed since he could walk; he grew up here and started driving a tractor at the age of 7. Hopefully he did not start driving this big blue tractor at that young age; it is gigantic.

Their family has farmed here since 1911; more than 100 years. The Koch's grow corn, soybeans and alfalfa hay.  There are 400 stock cows. Tom explained to me that those animals are at his farm to stay. The calves born from these cows are sold later. Besides the regular farm buildings there's a new style hoop-barn across the road. Here is where the Koch's feed cattle to sell to the market in future. Every day Tom spends his morning feeding the cows.

We walk towards the modern hoop barn. While it all seems neatly organized and clean to me, Tom and Lexy apologize for the mess. I look again... No mess, no smell and 1000 happy young men. The new barn has been a great success; according to Tom it takes away the extremes of the weather. Bearing the cold South Dakota winters is a piece of cake in this barn.
Tom and Lexy both have a passion for cattle. The corn and hay from the farm is all being used to feed the cows. Only the bean harvest is being sold. The manure from the cows is being applied to the fields, which makes a great organic fertilizer. A full circle: feed-cows-manure-feed.

Why farming? Lexy loves the way of life at the farm and to raise her family here. "Farming is a family effort", according to Lexy. Tom enjoys working outdoors and being his own boss.
Proud of the great products they raise, the enthusiastic couple assures me that they eat meat from their own farm. Lexy loves to cook, and chats about stuffed peppers with ground beef, rice, black beans and cheese. Inspiring!
A new generation farmers, innovative and dedicated to feeding the world. I'm looking forward to the future of the Koch's.