Attending the AgChat Conference: An #Agnerd's Paradise

Last week I had the honor of attending the AgChat Foundation Agvocacy 2.0 Conference in Kansas City, MO. I started participating in the #agchat community, a weekly Twitter chat for those involved in or interested in agriculture, over 1 1/2 years ago and this conference gave me the opportunity to finally meet many of the people who I have talked to frequently through this community. I had wanted to attend the conference last year so you can imagine how excited I was to go this year.

The blue dots represent locations that conference participants are from. 

The first event was a tweep-up for both AgChat conference and NAMA (National Agri-Marketing Association) Bootcamp, which were both being held in Kansas City at similar times. According to Kelly Rivard, who organized it, we had over 100 people total attend. Several people at the tweet-up asked me if I knew anyone else there and my response was "Someone from my high school is coming and I've met a few others once or twice but that's it." The few I had met before were from the Midwest and this conference gave me the opportunity to meet people from all over, as well as others close to home. That first night I met Brandi Buzzard, who did a blog giveaway for Shyanne boots that I won. Brooke Clay ended up wearing those same Shyanne boots that I won the next week, as did I. 

My brand new Shyanne Daisy Mae boots. They need to be broken in yet, but I love them!

Brooke Clay and I both wearing our Shyanne Daisy Mae boots to see a Craig
Morgan concert  in the Power  & Light District of Kansas City.

I got so much from the conference that it's hard to put into one post. I keep thinking back on it and how much I got from it. There was meeting all these awesome people who are so incredibly passionate about agriculture, feeling excited about the future of agriculture, learning new social media tools, enjoying nights out on the town with new friends and gaining new perspectives by learning from each other.

The swap meet, while not an official event, was a great way to learn about other areas of agriculture as people traded items that are representative of agriculture in their home state. I brought New Glarus Spotted Cow and Capital Brewery Supper Club beer from Wisconsin, as I've now lived in cheeseland for over a year. I got some unique items from various states and learned some interesting things, such as how growing popcorn differs from growing your typical field corn. Before the swap meet, our dinner table had a great discussion about the differences between organic and conventional dairy. I sat next to a calf raiser on a conventional dairy who asked the Zwebers and I questions about our organic dairies. There's so much to learn from others in agriculture as it's such an incredibly diverse industry.

The Peterson Brothers performed their "I'm Farming and I Grow It" first  thing in the morning

Of all of the things that I learned at the AgChat conference, what has stuck out most to me is the people and the power of connections. The people at the conference were all simply great people. I got to catch up with someone who went to the same high school, celebrate the birthday of someone who's blog I've read for a while, watch new friends ride a mechanical bull and overall have meaningful but exciting conversations about agriculture. I enjoyed meeting with everyone and it really drilled home the importance of making connections with those not directly involved with agriculture and this is further emphasized every time I talk about my background with someone I meet in Milwaukee.

Family Farming

I didn't get to see my dad for Father's Day and I felt bad because I saw my mom for Mother's Day, as it was the day after my college graduation, plus nobody was home with my dad for Father's Day this year.  The older of my two younger brothers is currently at Lackland Air Force Base for basic training and won't be home until November because he has skills training immediately after.  My youngest brother has been gone most of the month with different conferences and on Saturday he left for a boy scout camp.  I've been living in a Minneapolis suburb since the middle of May and my mom came to the Twin Cities area this weekend to attend a graduation party so she decided to spend time with me as well.

Despite not being with my dad for Father's Day, both of my parents have taught me the importance of family.  I believe farm families are especially aware of what it means to be a family and how important it is because they work together and play together.  My mom was a city girl who married a dairy farmer and they had very different backgrounds but both love the farm and have been incredibly supportive parents.

My dad grew up in a large family on the same farm that I grew up on and he always had to work on the farm. He went to tech school for Farm Business Management and joined his dad on the farm immediately.  Even though my dad had to work on the farm, my brothers and I were never forced to do chores, though he would ask for help when necessary.  I learned to drive tractor and feed cows because I wanted to and because I enjoyed it.

Working on the farm with my family brought me closer to them.  I did a lot of things with my brothers and my dad that most families don't do together: picking rocks, unloading hay and moving cattle.  (My mom cannot help much on the farm due to asthma and allergies but wishes she could more.)  Even though we would occasionally still fight while working, we often had good times too.  We got to have fun while working because we were interacting with family.

My brothers and I at YELLO, a state 4-H leadership conference, when I was a MN State 4-H Ambassador.

Besides working together, my brothers and I were all in 4-H, all showed rabbits at some point, and were all in drama in high school.  We're all different and those similar activities were good to have together.  My parents were always fully supportive of everything we were in despite being busy with my dad milking cows and my mom working off the farm most years.

Visiting Home

There's no place like home.  I feel this classic "Wizard of Oz" line is even more true for people, like me, who feel a strong connection to the farm they were raised on.  I've traveled and lived away from home, and currently live 2 1/2 hours away, but I do love home and that's partly because it's where the farm is.

This weekend instead of staying in the Twin Cities, I went home after work on Friday.  My uncle has been living at my home for the past week to help my Dad with fencing so he was there and will be staying for at least another week.  It's nice that my Dad has the extra help because my youngest brother is the only sibling still at home but he's gone for most of June at a 4-H conference, Boys State, and a boy scout camp.

I always enjoy being back on the farm.  When I'm in the city I miss the cows, I miss the fields, and I miss doing chores.  I like to go back home and feed the cows and clean the barn, simply because I think it's fun.  I like to talk to my dad about the crops and about what's happening on the farm.

Cows are nice and I've had some great favorites, but this weekend one of my favorite parts was playing with the young calves.  We have 4 heifers in the pen that houses the youngest calves and they are all very friendly.  this weekend I petted the 4 young heifers for at least 10 minutes.  It's fun to see how curious they are and how much they like to be petted.

Of course this year hasn't been a normal planting season and I was able to talk to my Dad more about that while I was home.  My Dad hasn't even finished planting his corn and he just started last week.  Our farm has clay soil and it's been a cold, wet spring so planting got started very late for us.  My Dad is hoping to get some barley in as well but we don't have enough tractors to do both corn and barley planting at the same time.

On a non-ag related note, I also got to attend a grad party for one of my friends and her younger brother (her from college and him from high school), go to a bonfire the same friend had, and see the boyfriend who is currently interning at a company in Bismarck and living 7 hours from me this summer.

Taking Sides

I love agriculture and I love all aspects of it that I am familiar with.  I love the cows, driving tractors, picking rocks in fields, and the people in the industry.  Sometimes though, I feel like I am being asked to take sides on what is often a controversial, and often discussed, topic in agriculture.

Being from an organic dairy farm has put me in a somewhat unique position, especially when it comes to applying for jobs in the agricultural industry where I might be representing conventional farmers.  It seems that there is often a great divide between organic and conventional farming, one that I don't think necessarily has to be there. I know there are plenty of people who will disagree with me and say that one system is inherently better than the other. 

My family's dairy farm became organic about 9 or 10 years ago.  We always pastured our cows, but have even more pasture since we became certified organic.  Before we became organic, my dad started getting really sick and none of the doctors had an answer until one told him that it was a chemical sensitivity so he had to stop using chemicals on the farm.  When that happened, he looked into becoming certified organic, since we couldn't use chemicals anyways, and began the process.  Organic is a necessity for my dad to keep farming, but it's not for everyone.

We have lots of neighbors who are conventional farmers and I have never heard my dad saying anything to indicate that they should switch to organic.  He will certainly talk to them about it if they ask, but I don't believe it is something that should have to be forced upon all farmers.  Our neighbors primarily own small farms, like us, and care for the land and their cows like we do.  They simply choose to do so in different ways.