And when you see five to 10 combines come in and you see five to 10 grain carts come in to help get that crop out, that's what farming and community is about. It is competitive out there and the technology is like changing at an ever rapid pace. And there are no SOPs on a farm. Only industry that buys retail and sells wholesale. We are really at the mercy of everybody else. Grow a family farm in 2026 and beyond.
How would you do that? From South Bend to Evansville and everywhere in between, this is Get In, the show focused on the Hooser State and the incredible stories happening here today. I'm Nate Spangle, founder of Get Indiana, and I will be your host for today's conversation. This episode is brought to you by Cluster Truck, the pickup and delivery kitchen, born right here in Indianapolis, just like this podcast. Let's start with the best part. Use code get in at checkout for $5 off orders of $25 or more.
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Order now at cluster. com. And who knows, your food might even show up before this episode ends. And let's truck on into the episode. My guest today is Denise Scar Bro and she is a third generation Indiana agriculture advocate, lender, and farmer who serves as the chair of the Indiana Soybean Alliance. Alongside her husband Mark, she helps operate their family farm near Lacrosse where they grow soybeans, commercial corn, seed corn, and wheat while continually investing in new technology and sustainable farming practices.
Beyond the farm, Denise works as a commercial and agricultural lender. She represents Indiana farmers on national and international soybean organizations and has traveled around the world helping build export relationships that connect Indiana agriculture to global markets. Whether she's combining soybeans, volunteering with 4, or signing international trade agreements, Denise is passionate about ensuring Indiana farming remains strong for generations to come. I'm so excited to dive into what life looks like on a modern Indiana farm. Here we are out here in the middle of beautiful I guess we're on the south portion of Leaport County in northern Indiana. Yes.
I'm so excited to dive into all things farming. I'm excited to be here. Denise, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me. Uh I mean this is spectacular. We just got a little bit of a tour and got to oh pop around from, you know, the different spots around the farm and across the street and everything there.
And you guys have a heck of an operation up here. Thank you. Uh, I'm really excited to dive into your journey because I think it's on pretty good authority that you said, "No chance I move back home and no chance I marry a farmer." And here we are back 20 minutes from your hometown and you are uh married to a farmer. Absolutely. That uh definitely my plan growing up.
I grew up on my family's farm uh very active in it and and I definitely swore I was never marrying a farmer and never moving back uh home. So technically I didn't move home. I moved from Leaport to Lacrosse. So 30 minutes from home. But uh yes um we are the third generation raising the fourth generation on our farm. Um we have grown it um from a couple hundred acres to a couple thousand acres um through means of other people um retiring from farming.
Uh family giving us opportunities along the way. Um so my husband farms full-time. Uh we have a couple people that work with us on the farm. Our kids are involved. And then I do work full-time off the farm mainly for health insurance and a steady paycheck. Yeah.
Right. Because that is the interesting piece that I've learned from talking to farmers over the years is it isn't like you know you have a paycheck coming every two weeks. It's like you when you go depending on the price of crops you're out there you're watching the markets you're one part farmer one part mechanic one part stock trader commodities trader. It's a a lot to keep uh in line. What I'm curious to know is one, take me to your start of farming as an adult. When you go from being a kid, showing 4 age, growing up on a farm to like, oh snap, now I'm an adult and I like farming is part of our life.
So Mark and I uh both went to Purdue. He's a year older than I am. So he graduated a year before me. Um but when we were at Purdue and we actually started dating in high school, we met through 4. Um and and I really didn't think that I would come back to the area. I thought that I would have a job in corporate America and live in a city somewhere else.
Um, but obviously obviously God had a different plan for us. And uh, Mark wanted to come back. He used to work construction full-time. Um, and then I worked full-time as a lender. And slowly we grew our farm from, you know, 400 acres to the couple thousand that we have today. Um, but a lot of it was uh, we feel like we've had opportunities because we've given back to our community and given back in agriculture.
Uh we very much believe in being involved through volunteering. Um you know everybody wants well everybody wants to talk about agriculture but not everybody knows the truth. So we had an opportunity early in um our leadership careers through farm bureau um to be part of the young farmer program. Uh we served on the safe committee for that and then we served on the national committee and that allowed us to have some opportunities and meet people all across the country in different walks of farming. Um, I think sometimes we get so consumed with what we have here in Indiana, we kind of forget about the big picture of agriculture. And that's really been the great opportunity for us to serve on state board, local boards, state boards, and national boards.
Um, it's given us the opportunities to be able to see what all goes on, um, locally, uh, throughout the state and globally. Yeah. Agriculture. Well, that's an interesting piece because sometimes I think farmers keep their head down, stay in their lanes, and you know, like, hey, we're worried on, you know, getting a crop out in the spring, getting a harvest in in the fall, but talk about, you know, getting involved with Farm Bureau, getting involved with, I mean, today the Indiana Soybean Alliance. Talk about what uh like why why get involved in these organizations? Time is already so limited.
You're between raising a family, running your farm, working your full-time job. Why continue to volunteer with organizations that are tied to farming? Mark and I feel like it's very important for us to continue to stay involved because it gives us the opportunity to tell our story. We want to be the people that are out there telling them uh telling anyone that that wants to talk about agriculture of what's really happening on our farms. Um there are so many misconceptions on social media, in the media in general what's out there. Um, and by us being involved, it gives us the opportunities to do things like today, to have a conversation with somebody and just talk about what's going on in farming in Indiana.
Um, and then farming outside of Indiana also. But my husband Mark doesn't love to always talk in front of people. He has gotten so much better over the years from when we first got married. Um, he is watching right now from the background. But I feel like I've had the opportunity through my career in lending and everyone that I've worked for, um, working for a a corporate lender and then working for a community bank that I do now, um, they find the value. I mean, I'm working with farmers every day on the lending aspect and then I come home to my family farm every day also and do that at the night and weekends.
So, it allows me to keep a constant connection between all of my customers and my neighbors and all the farmers throughout the state. It allows me the opportunity to tell the story that maybe somebody doesn't have the time to leave their farm to be able to talk about um the issues that are going on. I just feel like I've been very fortunate and it's kind of a calling that I've had for me to be able to serve on some of these state and national um boards to be able to do the work that somebody at home maybe they can't leave their family farm, maybe they don't have anybody else there to help them when they're gone. My husband and kids are great because I have been gone a lot. you know, the last nine years serving on the Indiana Soybean Alliance, um, I've taken trips internationally. I've taken trips throughout the country.
And I am 100% thankful that I have a family behind me backing me up for everything that I And Mark will be the first one to tell you that I have an overcommitment problem. And I do, you and me both. But, I mean, it's something I love. And I mean, you know, with us both growing up on farms and I'm hoping that, you know, I don't know what our daughter's going to do, but I know Parker's already talking about wanting to come back on the farm and he's only 13 years old. Um, you know, I want our farm to be better than what we the way we got it. We want to continue, you know, with our, you know, we we're heavily irrigated.
Um, we grow a lot of cover crops. You know, we try to keep something growing on our farm all year round because we want it to be better for the next generation. And I'm hoping that my kids have kids and you know we're we're going to have the fifth, sixth, seventh generation come back to our farming operation. Wow. Okay. Few different things here.
One, you talk about traveling with the Indiana Soybean Alliance. Why is it important for Indiana farmers to go out? I mean, you've been to places like Egypt, Taiwan, Dubai. What how is that benefiting your family farm here in Northern Indiana? So, one of the most interesting my first trip ever, I just got on the board and we went to Vietnam. Um, I've had a couple opportunities to go to Vietnam and Asia and different places um, around the globe.
But what is so interesting is when you have these mission opportunities, you are literally sitting there with a buyer. You know, I think we we here as farmers, you know, we're selling our grain to a local co-op or to a, you know, a biodiesel or, you know, some place that's that's going to um, take our crop and make it into something else. We are selling our whole product to another country internationalally. Can you explain that to me? Because from what I know about farming, which is not a ton, but it's always been like, hey, you when the price gets to something that you like, you take it over to Cargill, you take it over to the local elevator, you sell it there, and you know, it's done. It's done.
They they cut you a check. Like, talk to me about global markets and how negotiating deals and things like that can help benefit Indiana farmers. So, I mean, obviously being a farmer here in Indiana, I don't have those opportunities to sell my product directly from my farm globally. Now, there are some farmers within Indiana that grow some specialty food grade soybeans that actually get put on containers and go directly to Taiwan and to Japan and to some other countries. Is that like edetomame? Like that kind of thing?
Um, no. It's like a uh it has to do with the hilum on the soybean. Oh. And then um you know Ind Indiana's the number one producer of hyleic soybean oil. So, you know, now if you go to like Lucas Oil, uh you go to Purdue IU, they are all using the hyoleic soybean oil in their concessions. So, when you eat chicken tenders and fries, when you're at Lucas Oil or or any of the um the Indians games in Indianapolis, all of those, all of that food is now being fried in hyleic soybean oil.
It's a it's a heart-healthy product that we have here. Um, but kind of going back, one of the biggest opportunities about going to other countries is I am meeting directly with somebody that's buying US grains. Okay? And the biggest thing is is a lot from a lot of these other countries, they want to know the people that grew it. So while the grain may not be coming directly from my farm, it gives them an opportunity to meet a farmer. They just want to know what the people are like that are growing the crops.
And that's the biggest thing when you go in internationally. You know, our biggest competitor is South America. And when you go to other countries and talk about the products, they will say that that US grains are the most consistent quality product that they import. Not other countries have that same reputation that we do. And so being able to sit there and talk to somebody who is buying US grains, it may not be from my farm, but anytime we can move grain from the United States to um export it to another country, that's a win for me. Yeah.
Okay. Wait. So, how does that work then? How does a place like Taiwan, cuz you were involved with, was it $4. 2 billion of future investment into Indiana grain? It's not just Indiana.
It was US grains. US grain. US grains. They were just here in Indiana and that's where we did the signing um the letter of intent that they signed to continue to have the relationship with the United States of of of buying their grain. Okay. So, Taiwan commits to buying $4.
2 billion of US grain. How does it end up there? Like how does it go from potentially this farm or potentially any American farm? How does it end up in Taiwan? A lot of it gets on rails on ships and a lot of it like like from the field though. So you harvest you cut soybeans uh and you take it to an elevator.
Yep. Uh the biggest elevators around us right now are Keystone. We can get to one of those in 15 20 minutes. Um a lot we will take um some soybeans to Louis Drifus over by Clayool, but that's an hour plus for us. But that's the closest processing plant that we have. So what'll happen is we will take it to one of our local Keystones and from there it'll either get trucked to another facility, but a lot of times it's train actually the rail yard that uh the railroad track that goes behind us, you can see probably the the trains in the background.
Um that actually goes right into Molden and then that a lot of times gets shipped either to the east coast. A lot of um grains go for for hog and chicken consumption on the east coast. Okay. But if we're looking at them internationally, a lot of them go through the ports down in Louisiana and then they get on on big container ships or big ships that then take them overseas. It leaves from our farm on a semi it goes to a co-op or whatever processing facility and from then it either if it's a processing facility it gets made into another product and then shipped somewhere else. Um or from here it gets made you know the whole bean or whole corn goes to the grain elevator and then it gets shipped out.
majority of it where we are here where we're located in northwest Indiana goes out by rail. Ah okay. So what are the products that soybeans Indiana corn are being used for? Like what what do they end up becoming that a consumer might see? So I mean two of the biggest things are biodeiesel um hyleic soybean oil for soybeans um or any kind of a soybased product and then a corn can go for ethanol. Um we have an ethanol plant that's probably about 45 minutes away from here.
Um, and then there's another one just east of us about another 45 minutes. Um, so ethanol, I need those. I mean, obviously that goes into your fuel systems. Yeah, that would go into your cars, but I mean really, if you look at the back of a lot of ingredients, corn and soybeans go into so many foods. Um, a lot of corn and soybeans go into animal products like to be made for feed for animal products. I mean, there's just so many uses for all of it.
And we are continuously looking. Um, you know, the Indiana Soybean Alliance supports the student soybean innovation competition at Purdue. Um, and it allows Purdue students to come up with a product that is made out of soybeans. No way. It is. It's my one of my favorite events.
Like, what are some of the products you've seen? Um, soybean soy crayons is one of the things that came out of that over the years. Different kinds of soybean candles. There have been a gamut of things um from baby wipes um to foam that can go into houses for insulation. I mean, it is amazing. It's always in March.
It's always at Purdue. And the students that compete in this competition, I mean, I'm a Purdue grad, but I wasn't anywhere near that intelligent to be able to participate in something like this. But just to see what students come up with year in and year out, it it really allows us the opportunity to be able to um continuously look for new ways for to utilize soybeans. How important is Purdue to Indiana farmers? I mean, Purdue is a land grant college. I mean, it does a lot of research.
Um but we don't just fund activities from Indiana Soybean Alliance only to Purdue. Um we've partnered with things at IU. We've partnered with um a study at Notre Dame. Um, you know, we we do have funds. I mean, our chuck off dollars go toward towards funding um, you know, new uses research. Talk to me about what that means.
Every bushel of soybeans that we sell, a certain amount goes to the soybean chuck off. So, that is how you um, and really what our board of directors for the Indiana Soybean Alliance does is is we designate what those funds are going to be for. So we will have um you know different places um that will um submit to us proposals of of they want funding for different things and then we as a board go through all of those proposals and decide what we can fund. Wow. And it's not just a red stamp that if we've done it before that we're going to continue doing it in the future. You know, we want to see that um our check off dollars are being used to the best of our abilities.
We want to make sure that they're good research projects. We want to make sure they're for um good uses that are going forward. I mean, we as a board of directors, it's our responsibility to use the Indiana Chuck off dollars to the best of our ability. Now, is every farmer part of the Soybean Alliance? So, every every farmer that sells soybeans um participates in the check off. You have the opportunity to be a member of the Indiana Soybean Alliance and the Indiana Corn Marketing Council.
Yeah. Okay. So I want to talk about your trips like when you go and represent obviously Indiana soybean farmers, you represent United States, you know, from the the agricultural perspective, what does the outside world think about the agriculture that's being done here in the United States? What's been interesting is when you meet with these buyers and you meet somebody from another country, they just have a lot of questions because um obviously what you see on media all the time isn't always the truth. So what they see a lot of times I know a lot of times you see factory farms you know conglomerates all kinds of things you know 96% of the farms in the United States are family farms but like how is the acreage split between that like that's the one I've always been curious about because it does seem like uh like the media or anyone says like the family farm keeps getting smaller while the big corporate farms continue to get bigger.
I don't know if there's an actual acreage number that's out there, but like I'll use our family farm for an example. You know, when Mark and I started farming 23 years ago, you know, we just had a couple hundred acres. We both worked full-time. We had that. And the way our operation has grown has been because farmers have retired. There's nobody in their family to carry on that family farm that they have.
And so that has given us the opportunities to gradually grow our farm for what we have. Um, so a lot of our ground is cash rented. So we we don't own it. Um so if let's say if you owned farm ground and you don't want to farm it yourself, you we would pay you to farm your ground for you. Y and so for us for what we've had, you know, we were two 20some year olds farming both working full-time. We have gradually grown our farm over 23 years, 14 years ago.
Mark quit his job working construction full-time because we were farming too much for both of us to farm full or work full-time and continue to farm. Yeah. Grew our farm. We had one employee grow come work for us and now we're up to three employees and you know our kids help, I help. There's so much fictitiousness in what they call a a corporate farm or conglomerate farm. Just because you see the word LLC or a corporation behind it doesn't mean it's not a family farm.
Our farm is still a family farm and we farm several thousand acres. Yeah. I mean, we have neighbors around us that it's still a family farm. The family owns it, but they're farming 10 to 20,000 acres totally. I mean, it it's kind of it depends on the commodities that you grow, what you have, and what takes the time. I mean, there's we are really blessed here in Northwest Indiana, um, with the aquafers that we have and our irrigation.
A lot of specialty crops are grown around here. Oh, like what? We grow a lot of seed corn. Um, and that's what's right behind us right now is seed corn, but it takes a lot more time and a lot more labor that goes into Wait, what's the difference if you talk about I know we said that in the beginning about seed corn versus commercial corn. What's the difference? So seed corn is is going to be the seed that will be planted in years to come.
So typically the next year. So it's it's like growing the parent crop. So we have male and female rows out here. And that always gets me too that there's male and female corn. This is the trivia question for non-ag agriculture listeners out there. How many ears of corn are on one stock?
One to two. If you see any cartoon depiction of corn, it's like you got seven ears of corn coming out of there and then you go and like look at a real one and it's like one maybe two, but then they're kind of usually jaggedy looking. Anytime there's like a loosely agriculture related podcast, I always talk about my best friend Andy. He's a farmer in northern Indiana over in Breamman and he got me with that and I think he like wagered me 20 bucks and of like the over under of two ears and I was like, "Oh, it got to be over." I've seen all the little like pictures of corn way under misrepresentation. Yeah.
Right. Come on there. So you guys are growing seed corn back here. You have commercial corn. I think that you're totally right when when people think about, you know, as you start to grow and get more acreage that it's no longer family far a family farm, no longer familyowned. I mean, talk about if if you were replanted, pun intended, if you were replanted here as a 25, 26 year old that wanted to build a like wanted to grow a family farm in 2026 and beyond, how would you do that?
The capital expense is unreal. Yeah, it's hard. I I do not know if anybody can truly start a grain farming operation without having some kind of a family tie or somebody that's retiring and you're taking over their operation. The capital expense of what we have right now is just astronomical. You know the most interesting thing about agriculture is we are the only industry that buys retail and sells wholesale. So we are really at the mercy of everybody else.
So you know when we are looking can you explain that buys retail sells wholesale. Yep. So we we don't get to say what we're going to buy our inputs for. You know the price of our you know chemicals, fertilizer, seed, fuel. Like I mean if you would have told us that diesel fuel is going to be six bucks right now like holy moly. Do you know the amount of fuel we go through you know when you're looking at filling a 10,000galon tank that hurts real bad.
That's not a no one ever likes to fill up their gas tank. You don't want to fill up the 10,000galon diesel tank. Like that's a heck of a check to write. But when you are talking about we you know we sell sell sell wholesale you know we don't get to set set the price of what we're selling our commodity for. Yeah. We are at the mercy of being able to do our due diligence and try to sell at the best price that's kind of set for us.
Well, I do think that that is a rise on more on the livestock side where it's like uh freerange this or you know like direct to consumer freezer beef like all natural that kind of thing. But on the on the crop side, it's yeah, it's not like you can say, I don't know, like we're boutique corn or we're boutique soybeans. It's like you're kind of watching the commodity prices go up and down and literally it's again if you talk to farmers, it's like depending on the day whether they're going to be happy or they're going to be ticked off. Well, and and that and that's one of the reasons, you know, we have so many specialty crops grow grown our way, but you know, the more specialty crops you have, it's the larger investment on the front end and and um it can reap the biggest rewards financially, but it's also the biggest risk. Yeah. So, there's a lot of um tomatoes grown around us for red gold.
Um potatoes are grown for black gold. Um and Leonard is up in this way, too. Um, so those are kind of the biggest crops that we have around our way, the specialty crops, but you you know, we get one bad storm that comes in and and wipes out one of those crops and and you're done. Like it it it's it's such an expensive crop to put out there that we are so resilient on mother nature. And yeah, we've had four tornadoes in this area in the last 3 months. And if you would have told me we had had tornadoes before, I would have been like, ah, it's no big deal.
But when you see some of your neighbors houses completely destroyed from them and crops completely destroyed, it's it's really um it's really eye opening and and it's just it's gut-wrenching to see um how quick a crop failure can happen. Yeah. Well, I do want to talk about a little bit more diving into that. You know, you guys started with a couple hundred acres, you know, taking over uh from the second generation, correct? So, if you were today again, you know, maybe you're farming a family farm, you've got a few hundred acres. For the young farmers that might be uh listening in, like looking for some words of wisdom, how could you grow something from a few hundred acres to a few thousand acres over 20 years, like starting today?
Patience. Yep. Okay. Which I don't have much of. Um, luckily my husband and I have exact opposite um personalities. He has a lot of patience.
Uh, but what are the actions that you could take? biggest thing is saving money. Gosh. Yeah. Like I mean we we used to call ourselves the night and weekend warriors. You know, we both worked full-time.
We farmed several hundred acres. And you know, Mark worked construction. He would leave by 4:00 a. m. in the morning. He would come home between 4:00 or 5 at night.
He'd farm till 10, 11, 12:00 at night and get up and do the same thing the next day. You know, it's hard work. I mean, there's nothing easy that comes about it. But we also feel like we've had opportunities because some people that have retired from farming have seen how much we've invested in our community and in our state. Like people that want to pass on their farming farm to the next generation. They want to know that it's going to another family.
They want to know that it's going to be another family that wants to give back and wants to continue to grow their operation for the next generation. We have just had some of those opportunities kind of fall in our laps. what does not fall in your lap because you talk about being a volunteer with the soybean allies, being a volunteer with 4, being a volunteer with Farm Bureau. Like it's you're networking, you're doing these like big corporate business executive type things, but here it's just volunteering at organizations in your local community. And you think about why you don't just keep your head down on your farm and and work work. You have to do that.
But then you talk about going out, shaking hands, kissing babies, like being a part of your community so that when someone gets to their retirement age, they're like, "Hey, you know, that Denise sure is fun." Like I I think they'd be a great a great way to fulfill our legacy and keep our farm going on like and they'd be good stewards of our land. And that's what we hope for. I mean, that that's what we strive for in our farming operation is is for people to see that, you know, we're doing a nice job um on our farm and that they want to be like, "Oh, we'd like to have those people come farm our ground." This episode of Get Inon is sponsored by Greeks Pizzeria, Indiana's original scratchmade pizza since 1969. They've stayed focused on what matters.
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Order online at greeks pizzeria. com. Now, let's get back into the episode. When someone is evaluating what type of farmer to take over their ground, what type of farmer they're looking for to farm their ground, what are the factors? Like, for me on the outside looking in, it's kind of like, okay, well, they again, if you're not in it, you're like, they all they all go out there and, you know, disc it up. They all go out there and plan it.
they all go out there and put the right kind of uh substances and chemicals or whatnot on it or lack thereof like what are the differences? I I think farming is probably more relation relationship or relationship um based in general. Tragedies happen. Tragedies happen in the farming community. And when you see a tragedy happen and you see a farming community come together for something, um, like when somebody passes away, somebody gets an accident and they know they have to get the crop out. And when you see 5 to 10 combines come in and you see 20 semiis and you see, you know, 5 to 10 grain carts come in to help get that crop out in a couple days.
That's what farming and community is about. And I think that's what what farmers look for is, you know, who will continue to to service it and do the right thing. Yeah. And for the most part, that's all the farmers. Yeah. My grandpa, uh, he ran a farm and a farm supply company out of Wyatt, Indiana for so many years.
And at his funeral back in, oh, the early 2010s, uh, there was an Amish guy that came in and talked to my grandma and told the story of how one time their harvester had, you know, broken a belt or something and they couldn't get the they couldn't get the part until like two days from now. And my grandpa just gave him the keys to his and said, "Go take ours. Like, we got to harvest in." And he told that story 60 years later at my grandpa's funeral. And it like brought my grandma to tears. It was amazing.
And it was like those community members are so important. Uh, and your reputation, it matters. You talk about, you know, growing, being able to be in the position to grow your family farm. You do have to have a reputation. The other piece that I find interesting though is you talk about modern farming techniques. you know, like I I looked over there and you guys are doing intercropping or cover crops or these different innovations per se that are happening on farms.
How are you learning about those? Like again, you guys are intercropping down there. How did you learn about doing this? And this was 15 years ago for you. Uh, I think a lot of it is you learn from others and and honestly one of the best things is when Mark and I were younger, we um served on that National Young Farmer and Rancher Committee and it allowed us to be able to talk to other people and and even serving on um the state soybean board. You meet people um that necessarily aren't I mean they're not in your backyard.
they're still doing the same thing as you throughout Indiana, but they're a little bit more open than somebody you're maybe competing with down the road for, you know, some extra acres or some extra yield quality. Um, but having those relationships, I mean, a lot of times, you know, you read articles. I mean, social media is a great way to get information anymore, any kind of source of media that's out there. Um, but just having conversations with people. Yeah. And we saw one of our neighbors start doing the intercropping.
And so we started out talking with them about it and then over the last 15 years Mark's just kind of modified it and um I feel like we've got a pretty slick operation in the way he does it now. Um but it is a lot of trial and error. But see this is the interesting piece. Let's say you are a lifelong farmer. Uh so you start you know you become the decision maker. I'm going to put in air quotes there.
When you're 30 and you then for the next 30 years are until you're let's say until you're 60 and then your kids take over. You only have 30 planning seasons. You only have 30 harvests. Like you talk about a lot of trial and error. Like you can't miss the mark by that much or you end up like you can't ruin one of 30 of your plings. Like that seems that seems intimidating to make a big change or to try something different.
It's a risk. I mean anything. But, you know, you're not going to go out there and start on 400 acres and risk it the first time. I mean, it's, you know, starting out smaller, starting out 50 acres, 100 acres, you know. Were you nervous when you guys first started doing intercropping? Well, we hadn't planted wheat on this farm in so long.
And so, something a little different. And our operation is um Mark's dad passed away 2 days before our first wedding anniversary. So, really, we were kind of thrown into the trenches as 23 and 24 year olds. Oh gosh. Of fully taking over the farming operation. You know, my parents have been great sounding boards.
We have a lot of great neighbors that helped us those first couple years get through things like you know that first harvest trying to figure out how to run the grain dryer. Mark's dad had always run the grain dryer. It's just those little things and and you know we talked about the community coming together but we have had opportunities because we've been the only decision makers. So our story is a little bit different. While we are a generational farm, we took over at a much younger age than what most people have the availability to. and you didn't have uh maybe like uh the proverbial old guard that it's like well we've always done it this way like why don't we keep doing like what's so wrong with the way we've always been doing it and I feel like there is that need for I say like gentle innovation because it is competitive out there and it's hard and you talk about like I mean you talked about uh soil not erosion but what when it blows off up here like putting cover crops down to keep your soil quality high and like you know the the technology technology is like changing at an ever rapid pace and there are no SOPs on a farm usually like no one went around and got the employee handbook of like how to run the grain dryer.
It's like oh yeah it's been in grandpa's brain for the last 55 years like that's like that's a lot. So, so our story is a little bit different that way because we I mean all the decisions have just been based on Mark and I. But, um, Mark is very methodical in the way he is looking at making changes on things. And so, the way we have done it over the years, we've kind of just started small and grown from there and seen how it's worked. Um, and you know, we used to do 30 and 15 for the soybeans and the wheat. Now, it's all 15inch rows.
and and Mark and I were he was just talking he he was talking to Anita and and um Amy about it a little bit and we're seeing some you know carryover of different products from having to irrigate because we've got a lot of iron in our in our water here. You can see the irrigation is a little rusty behind us. Everything is constantly evolving in agriculture and if you don't change you're going to be behind. The biggest thing right now is technology and how much technology changes. I mean, basically every piece of equipment has an iPad in it or some kind of, you know, computer-based system in it. And, you know, it's great that we can gather all this information and we can compare it year to year, but the cost of keeping up with technologies is when you're barely making a profit in farming right now, it's hard.
And, you know, you were asking for advice earlier. And, you know, with Mark and I both having two incomes for a long time, that's what really helped us get ahead. It helped us build our working capital. It gave us some of the flexibility that we could take a chance and and if we didn't do well at it, then we knew that financially we'd still be okay to be able to farm another year. Yeah, that is the piece of of the farms I see that are growing, they usually have like an excavation business or ditching or tile or something even like spraying other people's crops or hauling, you know, the semis. M you've got your you've almost got like side gigs to fund the main gig even though the main gig takes up so much time.
It's wild. It's 100% the truth. Oh gosh. That is that is wild to think about. Well, when you talk about innovations, you talk about obviously, you know, what is in the cab. You talk about iPads and computers.
It's like you get ready to go out and uh you know, it's in the fall and you're breaking out the combine. You got to have like a software update to make sure you're like which is just wild to think about. What? And when you're out here in the middle of nowhere trying to get software to update, it's a real challenge sometimes. Yeah, we're supposed to rip at 5:00 a. m.
tomorrow. You like 4:30 and it's like, what the heck? We got to the spinning wheel. Two hours for the for the software update. Like, what are you even talking about? But what innovations in agricultural technology get you really excited?
The whole mapping and guidance. So GPS that that's just been a total game changer um in general in farming having having the GPS technologies but the mapping and so being able to have your technology say exactly where you planted and then when you're harvesting you know you get that same data and you can compare okay you know this is how much you know what population we planted you know you can see then immediately when you're harvesting you know it gives you the colors it's kind of like a stoplight green is good yellow is average red says, "Oh my gosh, something bad happened." But it lets you compare for what you planted and then maybe um you know, your spraying applications are on there, too. Fertilizer applications, all of that stuff's recorded. So, it allows you to get a better picture of where your crop succeeded and where your crop failed. So, you know, we were really wet and then we got really dry during planting and then um the first week of June, we had 5 to seven inches of rain.
So when you look around at our fields, you see drowned out spots. Um you don't see a really pretty field of anything up here in northwest Indiana. And so going around when we can collect that data at harvest, it kind of lets us see, okay, was this a drowned out area that we didn't have a crop or did we have some kind of a failure with the seed production or was something else we had blended in there? Well, you talk about like what a pretty crop looks like. I want to know factor fiction. Kneeh high by the 4th of July.
Is that still a thing? No. cuz I feel like it's like shoulder. Again, I'm not that tall, but I feel like it's it's way above the knee these days. I mean, so seed corn gets planted later, so it's always a little bit shorter. And when you have the male and female row, so this probably is not a good picture of what we have, but correct.
Um, you know, technologies are so much better and like our our our seed quality of the seeds we're getting, it's allowing us to plant an earlier crop. You know, typically southern Indiana is a couple weeks ahead of us just because they get warmer weather and we're so close to Lake Michigan up here, but you know, we are looking at planting soybeans earlier and earlier every year. You know, it used to be you planted your corn and then planted your soybeans. And we've kind of flip-fpped that in planting soybeans before we do corn. And we've had some really good successes with that. Yeah.
One interesting piece I think is that there is a large disconnect of the average hooser consumer and where a lot of their food, crops, all this agriculture production is happening. If if every hooser out there could spend a day on a farm, what lessons would you hope they left with? We're all still family farms. We're we are still families out here in the trenches every day um doing this. I mean, the number one thing we want to do is produce the safest and best product that's out there. Whether it's corn, soybeans, whether it's a specialty crop, you know, we have neighbors that are doing organic.
Um, I mean, we all work together and we have the same end goal. You know, we want to have good yields. We want to be able to produce a quality, consistent product year in and year out. Um, you know, our families live right here. You know, the biggest misconception is that we, you know, we are ruining the the water that we're drinking. Well, our wells are right here on the farm.
You know, we don't have city water. Um, you know, we're we're 30 minutes from a major city. Um, I'm 30 minutes to a big box store from where we live. We're literally out here in the middle of nowhere. You know, we're really good stewards. We record all the water that we use every year.
We we um send in a water usage report um that can consistently see what what water usage we're using. you know, our water table is so high right here where we're at. We're really fortunate with that. Um, we plant a lot of cover crops because it's better for for our our soils that we have here. You know, the pro the the things that we do on our farm are because we want to continue to make our farm better for the next generation. And do you feel like that's a mindset of the majority of farmers?
Absolutely. Farming is one profession even though it's a lifestyle. It is both a profession and a lifestyle where legacy just always seems to be at the forefront. Like today, we live in a world where it seems like a lot of people build whether it's businesses, uh whether it's whatever they might be building, companies, the whole nine yards to to sell it or to, you know, fold it into the next thing. But with farms, it always seems like they're thinking about like the next generation. They're thinking about one day we have all this like who's going to take this over?
who's going to be the steward of this to the to the grandkids to the great grandkids and beyond. I do think that is an interesting piece where it always legacy always seems to be a conversation that comes up with farmers. Is that like I mean do you do you feel like that's how the conversation you have a lot? I mean it's generational. I mean, the the thing, you know, Mark's grandpa was here and then so this was his mom's family farm. Um, and he farmed with his dad and, you know, we're on here now.
And I would I would love for my kids to come back to the farm, but I don't want them to feel the pressure to. I want them to be able to go do the things that they want to do um as they get older in life, too. But if they do come back, I want I want it to be the best farm that they can start out with their operation. But if my kids don't come back, I still want it to be the best farm because it's going to go on to somebody else's kids. Yeah. Like it it's going to continue being farm ground.
That is an interesting piece. Like you talked about it earlier, but like if I just said, you know what, I'm done with the podcast. I'm done with media. I want to get into farming. Is there even a way that I could like how would I how would I get into farming if I was totally net new? The biggest thing would probably be finding a farmer that's looking to retire in the next five to 10 years, start working with them, and then work out a plan to buy them out.
It's like, hey, it's like I know that I know nothing about farming, and I've largely never driven a tractor, but I think it could be a fun experiment. Would you see people starting, a lot of them starting out farming, they're starting on like a vegetable scale or flower scale, which is still cool. It's awesome. I would love to be able to do it, but I kind of like the the farmers market type farmer, which is super. And honestly, it's like you talk about rewarding. You have to really see the big picture to believe that or to like feel rewarded.
You know, you drop it off at an elevator somewhere and you know, goes out to make a big impact in the world versus if you sell at a roadside stand or you sell at the farmers market, everyone you get to see smiles on faces when they, you know, get your sweet corn. Like that is such a if you haul in a you know like a hay wagon full of sweet corn to the local farmers market you're a hero. Everyone's like giving you pats on the back like oh this is so good versus you take three tons of soybeans to the local and it's like cool here's your check it or it'll be in the mail in 3 weeks. And I love farmers markets and things like that because I I can't plant a garden and grow a garden to save my life but here we can plant thousands of acres of of row crops that are successful. So um I there's space for everybody in the a sector whether you're at a small scale or whether you're a large scale it every there is space for everybody there.
Yeah. Now you guys have deep roots in 4 and FFA like every great farm family does right. What excites you most about the next generation of Indiana's agricultural leaders. I'm thinking at it as a I mean I've I've got two teenagers. Uh Madison's Madison will be 18 and in October and Parker will be 14 in October. So looking at them come back.
So here in Leaport County when Mark and I were growing up, there was not a single FFA chapter. So our county now has multiple successful FFA chapters. So as our daughter has gotten involved in FFA and our son is new in it. I knew nothing about FFA. So as the uh soybean chairman last year, I got to give a speech at one of the delegate sessions. Oh.
And one of the things we talked about was, you know, I don't understand enough about FFA and I'm learning alongside of my daughter as she's getting in it and just the opportunities for leadership. Our daughter just got her Hooser degree, so we went to the state convention for that. These kids that are passionate, but what you're seeing is a lot of youth that are not directly driven from farms. So, they've gotten involved in an ad class through their school and it has made them passionate about agriculture. So they may not come back and directly farm but they are going to be doing something you know involved in agriculture. You know you know I'm an a lender so I don't have to live on a farm but I'm still involved in agriculture.
You know there are so many opportunities out there that touch agriculture that are not you know you don't have to go back to the family farm. Yeah. Can we go through a few of those? Like let's say you grow up, there may be someone out there that grew up on a farm that's like, "Well, I don't want to be a a typical farmer, but I want to work in an a adjacent industry. What are the types of careers you see young people pursuing in the a industry?" So, you know, some of the big ones are like grain buyers for the co-ops.
Um, I know that Keystone offers an opportunity for high school kids um and college that offer internships, you know, chemical sales, fertilizer sales, um, seed sales. Seed's huge in the area, but there's all, you know, there's all kinds of lending opportunities that are out there. Um, so you think about the a lender like me who who meets with the customer, but then there's somebody behind the scenes that's you're the analyst, um, the person that does compliance. There's all kinds of different um, avenues along the way there. But, you know, as I have traveled internationally, there's so many jobs with the USDA, with the Farm Service Agency, and a lot of those are not only lo, you know, locally, um, statewide and domestically, but they're also internationally. You know, there's all kinds of organizations around the world.
You know, we talked about going on those trade missions. um you know, US Soybean Export Council, you know, they have employees all throughout the world, people that are constantly working in different parts of the globe to promote and continue to export US grains. Um the opportunities are really endless. I've seen a ton of Purdue graduates specifically. I not that that's the only place you can get an up. Yeah.
Right. But I I do feel like Purdue just turns out lots of a adjacent career paths from Yeah. you know, uh, seed sales to working on the co-op side to there's so many there's even like marketing. There's like agricultural market. We're looking at the marketing team up here for the Indiana Soybean Alliance. Like there's a ton of really cool jobs that can blend an interest and a passion for agriculture and also industry, which I think is super fun.
The other piece that I'm curious about is to be an exceptional farmer, you need not only knowledge of how all the equipment works, how to fix it, be a mechanic now, like to a small degree be like a a software engineer at times. You also need a knowledge of finance, sustainability, you know, like you talk about commodities, you know, they had to look at the international news to see how the price of soybeans or corn like how can a farmer in Indiana increase their knowledge base without going and getting a bachelor's degree from like you don't have they don't have four years to go and quit the farm and say I'll be back. How can they push their knowledge forward and learn more about agriculture and farming? I think the biggest thing is just to be involved, okay, and talk to people. I give a lot of speeches of different things and I tell people all the time, it's not what you know, it's who you know.
Yeah. You know, being able to be connected with the right people and and that's really what's given us the opportunities over the years. You know, people that Mark worked with um in college are people that now do all of our a leader stuff. Um they do a lot of our our different people doing precision for us or working with us on that. Um the biggest thing is having the good partners. Yeah.
you know, with with our with people that we buy our chemistry from. Um, you know, they know our farms, they understand what we need, too. Um, it's having that relationship and and honestly, the biggest thing is having a relationship with your lender, you know, somebody that's that really understands your farming operation, and that's really what I've always prided myself on as a lender is having that relationship with my customer. You know, things are not rosy in agriculture right now. So, you know, the last 2 years have been some of the hardest renewal seasons that I've had as a lender in my 20 plus years. When you say renewal season, what does that mean?
So, most farms um have a line of credit. Yes. So, you know, like you talked about the pay, we talked about the paychecks. You don't get a paycheck every month from farming. You know, you buy all your inputs in the winter and the spring, you put out your crop and you don't get paid till fall or winter or next next spring whenever you're holding your grain over. So, cash flow cash flow is tough.
So, a lot of times you'll have a line of credit. So you you borrow on that to help pay for your inputs and then once you sell your grain you pay that off. This is an interesting piece too having a good relationship with the lender like that is not I would say top of mind for I don't know the majority of farmers you know it's kind of like oh yeah I need to you know have meetings and you know catch up and keep everyone up to date with what's going on. But really I mean any business that you're in most business have some kind of a line of credit that's out there. But it seems like opportunities in farming come in an inopportune time. So when things are tough, you know, you know, families are generational, but a lot of times that generation doesn't pass on until somebody passes away.
Yeah. So when you are looking at somebody passing away and not everybody comes back to the family farm and you know, um I listened to an attorney once say, you know, fair is not equal, but a lot of times they're still families are still dispersing the farm equally among siblings, whereas one may only be in. So, you know, you may be looking at having to make a land purchase or equipment purchase or buying somebody out when prices aren't great and you know, things are very marginable and the and having that relationship allows you the opportunity that somebody knows your operation and while things aren't great now, you can kind of look at that long ter long-term picture or know like you know we have in the back of our mind, you know, if something happens, you know, what's our XYZ plan to move forward and every farm should. You talk about getting involved. What are organizations that you'd recommend Indiana farmers get involved with?
Um, obviously Indiana Soybean Alliance or uh the Indiana Corn Boards um become members of those. It's great opportunities to get information of things that are happening throughout our state. Um Farm Bureau has been a great opportunity for us. You have opportunities there from your local level all the way to the state and national levels. 4 FFA um you know give back to your extension boards being part of that. Um be a donor, be a sponsor for your FFA.
I mean, those are your kids that are, you know, your youth that you're looking at. Um, hopefully we want them to come back into the communities that we're at. Is it though they do do they do soil judging or soil judging for FFA? Like I remember them saying like it's like how do you judge soil? So you dig like a hole. Our kids have been involved in it, but I've actually never been to it cuz I didn't have the opportunity cuz we didn't have FFA.
But like they'll dig a hole and you have to like give the different like gradings of the soil and the different soil types that are in there. But like you look at this field here and then if you go across the street, it's two very different soil types. You're on some sand here and then across the street you're on some muck ground that's close to the river. Wow. The thing is there's no consistency in agriculture. You can't just to say, "Hey, I'm going to go plant corn and soybeans and I'm going to do every field the same because it doesn't happen that way."
The attention to detail where you can tell if something is out of place. I think that the the farmer's attention to detail is like none other. Like again, I always say this, farmer is like the most versatile career path. Like again, one day you're like talking about lines of credit and the next day you're scooping out a soil sample to be like, "Ah, yes, this looks good." I think it's wild. We have come towards the end of the show where we get to talk all things Indiana.
Today we're ventured up to Leaport County. We're here in Lacrosse. Uh first time in Lacrosse. Uh does Lacrosse still have a high school? Yes and no. Yeah.
So it has combined. It's called Tri Township School now. Okay. So it is all in Wanata. So Wanata is K through 12 in all in Wanita, but they still use the old lacrosse gym for sporting events. The Tiger Den.
The Tiger Den. I mean, I I drove past it and it looks like a heck of a place. That's where Mark went to school. Mark, some rocking Were there some rocking basketball games back at the Tiger Den? Yes, sir. I love it.
Uh I do remember, again, I talked about this a little bit before we started recording, but a good mentor of mine was Jackson Traxel. Had to shout out Jackson on the pod. Uh parents live a couple miles up the road. That's the classic. You come to smalltown Indiana, if you know any name, just a last name, you're gonna Oh, yeah. A couple miles up and then his her aunt and uncle live over there and cousin Sally down the road.
And I love it. It just makes me feel right at home. But this is your opportunity to tell me a little something uh uh about part of whether it's Leaport County, Northwest Indiana, or just the state of Indiana that you love. What is a hidden gem in Indiana? I actually think Leaport County is kind of a hidden gem. Wow.
Oh, tell me more. So, we are geographically the second largest county in the state of Indiana. I had no idea. Yeah. Allen County is bigger than us. Okay.
Um, but other than that, we're the SEC and it's so unique. So, right now, we are basically at the southernmost tip of the county. So, the sizewise, Lake Michigan is the northern border. I mean, you've got the dunes up there, you've got a beautiful beach, um, you've got shopping, all kinds of restaurants, a lot of summertime people going in and out. We're the oldest fair in the state of Indiana. And it's actually still like a really cool county fair.
We have like a like if you ever go to the state fair, there's uh pioneer land. We've got a pioneer land there. Huge. Our livestock projects are actually still growing whereas a lot of them are shrinking. Um you know, our kids will exhibit uh beef cattle and swine at the fair. Lots of banners.
We'll we'll just say we'll call spade a spade. There are lots of banners hung up in the barn. I think they're doing a pretty good job at it. Our kids have been extremely successful. We're very blessed with that. Um, we've got concerts like like real people that come in like real large musicians.
Like it's a good time. Demolition derbies. There's all kinds of fun stuff. But the question is, do you have a dairy bar? We we do not. Oh, what?
We have our Farm Bureau milk cabin where you can get ice cold milk for only a quarter. So, the cheapest darn thing you're going to get at the fair. Wow. I will say that is that might be a deal breaker for me. I love the Dairy Barn like at um for me it was the Marshall County Fair and they just make the best ice cream. You never get it any other time like unless you go to the fair.
Like I don't know why someone doesn't serve this just year round cuz it's so delicious. But you go to any small town, county fair. When they have the dairy bar, it just does it for me. It's amazing. No, ours is milk. Ice cold.
It's ice cold white or chocolate milk. I respect that. It's amazing. All right. For a quarter. For a quarter.
You can't get anything for a quarter. You can't get anything for a quarter. No. Wow. Okay. Um, so I just think Leaport County just has a lot of different things to offer in general.
You go from cornfields to the to the beach. I love it. Okay. Next. This is where we source ideas for uh new guests or people in the state that are doing big things. Who's a Hooser we need to keep on our radar?
Someone who's doing big things. She has been my mentor my entire life. Her name is Heather Hill. Yeah. Heather and I actually grew up in Leaport together, so she's four years older than me. Um but she has been prime time promoter of um the pork industry.
So she uh served on the Indiana Pork Board. She served on the National Pork Board. Um she is just an amazing person. She if you go to the state fair, she does glass barn chats for us out there. Um she's just a fantastic person and she's a lot like me, a mom. Uh she works on the farm every day.
She's got three kids and she is also committed to constantly being somebody that's an advocate for agriculture. So, you and Heather are kind of like pork and beans. There you go. Like two peas in a pod. That's a perfect way to say it. I was I was as soon as you said that, she was so big into I was like I was I was sitting on the the pork and beans joke.
Um now, finally, this is the last question that we have for you. I want you to close your eyes and think about from fields to your time at Purdue to the state fair, the county fair, all the places that agriculture has taken you. But when you have to summarize it into the perfect day as a Hooser, what is your favorite Indiana memory? I've had the availability to travel a lot um domestically and internationally. And my favorite thing is always coming home. When I have been gone for, you know, 10 to 12 days on an international trip and I come home and it might be 2:00 in the morning and I see our family farm sign at the end of the road.
That's what's worth it. I love that so much. Uh that's what home is about, having a place that gets you excited to come back to. You guys have clearly built something super special here in Lacrosse. Uh it it's been awesome to get to hear your passion for the Indiana farmer. Uh I think the fact that you are, you know, so plugged into whether it be 4 or FFA or the Indiana Soybean Alliance, I think that that is important.
I think that that you're setting a great model for the younger generation of farmers of get outside of of just your property lines. Go out there, be active in your community, you know, shake hands, kiss babies, go around the world. Farming in Indiana can literally take you around the world, which is so crazy. It's like not it's like like definitely not on the average farmer's bingo card that you could, you know, volunteer for an organization and and end up going to Taiwan. But if you would have told me I would be doing all this when I was 20 years old, I would have told you you were probably crazy. like just the opportunities that have been afforded to come my way.
We I just feel blessed. I feel blessed to be able to represent, you know, the 22,000 farmers that are out there in the state of Indiana and and and beyond that. Yeah. If people want to learn more about the Indiana Soybean Alliance or if there anyone out there that wants to become a member, how can they do that? Andoy. org.
And it can give you all kinds of information on there. Um, I can give you contacts of who to reach out to, but uh, you can also see all your board of directors for the Indiana corn and Indiana soybean and reach out to any of them to be become a member. I love it. This has been so fun. I'm excited. Now, we're going to go tour around a little bit, see what's going on at the farm.
Uh, we appreciate it and we'll talk to you soon. Thank you. This show is made possible by our friends up at Sweetwater. Whether you're looking to start a podcast or take your content to the next level, click the link in the description to see all my gear recommendations at Sweetwater. If you want a behind-the-scenes look at everything we're doing across the state, make sure you follow me on Instagram and Tik Tok, Nate Spangle. Thank you so much for listening and being a part of what makes the Hooer State great.
We'll see you next time here on Get
