Environmental Sustainability

Sustainability video series:

1. Sustainability - Defining it

Happy Earth Day! In honor of Earth Day, today's sustainability video message revolves around the broad meaning of environmental sustainability to our farm.

Transcript of the video audio (in other words, here's the text version of everything I said in the video)

Environmental sustainability. I don’t know of many businesses that are as intertwined with the environment like we are as farmers. We do something to the environment and then it reacts and responds and provides something back to us in return. That interaction and engagement is so vital to a lot of the decisions we make of what we do and how we do it.

That often leads to the question of why do we just raise crops on our farm here in southeast Wisconsin near the Illinois border.

And it brings me back to a conversation I had a few weeks ago with our five-year-old daughter. We were at Cabela’s looking at all the fish and we started talking about how the fish are different – the ones that live in the ocean versus lakes versus rivers versus streams. And we talked about how the fish have been purposely created to be suited to those specific environments.

And that’s what we have a lot here in the Corn Belt. The whole Midwest part of the United States – and we’re just in the edge of that – is very well-suited to growing crops like corn and soybeans. Our land is very flat, which reduces the risk of soil erosion and run-off. Our climate is very well-suited and our soil is very fertile and supports those different crops.

Now that’s not to say that there aren’t farms in our area and throughout the Corn Belt that do other things. And we’re very grateful for them and we support them, as well. That’s just to say that’s why we do what we do.

And we’re happy to do that, and we’re happy to be a worldwide supplier of these products that are able to be used for so many different things – they’re very beneficial commodities. For people food, animal food, fuel for our vehicles – a renewable source, as well as for other unique products like crayons or plastics.

And we’re able to supply this on a worldwide scale. There are some other areas of the world that are also well-suited to growing crops like this. Namely South America – Brazil and Argentina – and there’s a lot of areas of the world that really can’t support much row crop production. So we’re considering that we’re using the tools and resources that we have and to be abundantly using them to the best of our ability.

Thank you. 

BEAN seeds are going in the ground!

When spring planting is around the corner, I always say that Ben will drive out to the field one day and doesn't come back for a couple months.

The girls and I went for a walk yesterday afternoon. We swung around by the shop like we frequently do to say "hi" to Daddy and Papa. When we came around the corner, Ben was fueling up the tractor and field cultivator to go work up the first field of the year. So we joined him! How fun that this year, we drove out to the field WITH him! Perfect timing!

This isn't actually the official start of planting though. It's just a test they're doing. We do a LOT of field tests to see what the results are before making a bigger adjustment. This particular test is to plant beans early. Common practice is to plant all the corn and then switch to planting beans, so beans are usually planted around a month after the corn. We've been hearing a lot about the potential benefits of planting beans early, so they decided to test it on 20 acres.

This is not a normal practice. In fact, when my father-in-law went to pick up the bean seed from one of the neighboring farmers who's also a seed rep, he asked if it was okay if he tells other people about it. I imagine it'll sound something like this: Do you want to know what the Nelsons are up to? They're planting BEANS right now! Not sure how that's going to go! Ha!

I see this as one of the benefits of us having a lot of crop acres - we can do a lot of these "field trials" and test different techniques. I imagine that someone with less acreage might want to be more conservative and only do what they know works best for them. A good test also needs to be done on a decent size scale, otherwise it could just be other variables affecting the results.

The pictures are fun, but not the best quality...phone was almost dead, squirmy toddler, lots of bumps...

I love these kinds of family pictures! Molly was freaked out - the chocolate (notice her lips), chips and music helped calm her down though.

At the very tip of the tree on the left was a big hawk waiting for us to kick up some mice. Pretty cool. 

I'm always amazed at how different the view is from the back of a field. We drive by this field ALL the time and look at it from the road, but when you're in back of the field looking toward the road, it's so different. Weird, but true.

Sustainability #1 - Defining it

Transcript of the video audio (in other words, here's the text version of everything I said in the video)

Sustainability. It’s a big buzz word now and everyone wants it, including myself. Now how does a farm know if they’re really being sustainable? There isn’t a line in the sand saying what is sustainable versus what isn’t, so how do they know?

Well the definition is “to be sustained, to endure, to last a long time.” Let’s remember that there’s a difference between sustainable and self-sustainable.

Our farm – my husband and his father – run 1,400 acres of crops. By today’s definition, that really isn’t a cool farm.  We don’t do niche products or direct marketing. We don’t even have animals on our farm. However, we strive to be sustainable and we’re proud of what we do and how we do it.  

By that base definition of sustainability – to endure and last a long time – our farm is sustainable. We actually have the original deed from 1912 – over 100 years ago – when my husband’s great, great grandfather, Andrew Nelson, bought the original 80 acres of the farm for $7,000 total. So my husband is the fifth generation stepping into the farm.

That’s a long time. There’s a lot to be said for that. When you look at American agriculture and the security of our food supply, we’re proud to be part of that backbone. When we can go to the grocery store and have the luxury of so many options and that fit within a family’s budget. We’re proud to be part of that.

So when you go to the grocery store, be thankful for even the common, ordinary food choices.

Thanks for your support!  And stay tuned for some more video messages focusing on the three measures of sustainability – environmental, economic and social. Thank you!

My "can-do" attitude - a blessing and a curse

I've always had a can-do attitude. Other words used to describe this aspect of my personality include drive, determination, problem-solving, confidence, stubbornness, pride and self-righteousness. Notice how those terms gradually shifted from being admirable qualities to character flaws?

They say necessity is the mother of invention. Been there, done that. "Blessing" side.

This weekend was an example of the "curse" side. Ben was gone all weekend on a family ice-fishing trip. Not a huge deal. The only thing to arrange for him to be away was that someone needed to put wood in the outdoor wood burners that heats our house and my in-laws house (his dad was on the trip too).

We are so fortunate to have neighbors and friends who are willing to help out. He actually arranged for one of them to do the wood while he was away.

I just had to open my big mouth. I said I could do the wood - I didn't want to be the damsel in distress who needed a guy to take care of us. I could handle it.

Surely, I could. But did I really want to?

At the time I did. I like physical work and I really like being tough. I would much rather be doing physical work than housework. So it was a task I was happy to take on.

Four problems:

1. I had plenty of other tasks that also needed to be done without adding this.
2. It was bitterly cold the first couple days he was gone so now I volunteered to go out in that weather.
3. The logs are big. I could lift them, but it definitely got my heart rate up. My father-in-law actually scoured through his piles and found all the smaller pieces and stacked them neatly right by the burner. Not sure if he felt bad for me or doubted that I could do it. Either way, it was nice. 
4. I had to arrange doing all this twice a day in two locations while supervising two little kids who couldn't be alone in the house and it was too cold for them to be out with me. 

After a couple times doing it, time got away from me Friday night. I went out there at 11:30 p.m. and didn't see much sign of life to the fire. Even though Ben gave me all the instructions, he hadn't really told me how to get it going from pretty much nothing. It was too late to call anyone. I freaked out a little, put wood in and prayed it would start up. I stayed awake another hour to see if the water temperature rose at all, signaling that it had started. Nope. It dropped slightly.

Without anything else to do, I went to bed..at least I tried to. I was pretty worked up. My logic told me it would be a big deal to just call the neighbor and see if he could help get it going in the morning. The house temperature wouldn't drop that much overnight for there to be any serious problems. That was my logic, which proved to be correct.

What really kept me awake was my irritation that I had failed. Grrrr. My pride was hurting. A lot.

After stewing about it for a couple days, I finally processed the take-away silver lining. Now that I've accepted that maybe I don't want to put wood in, I conveniently have an "out." When you can't do the task well, then it's easier to have someone else do it. It's like various farm tasks growing up - we would purposely avoid learning some of the roles because then we couldn't be expected to do them. Since I didn't really succeed at learning to do the wood, I'm sure I can easily get out of it in the future.

Unless my "can-do" attitude gets the best of me again...

I love winter!

I <3 winter! It's the only season of the year when we have a normal, predictable family schedule.

Winter for us means January 1 (after the holiday craze) through the unknown date when they head out to the fields the first time in spring and don't come back for 2.5 months (slightly exaggerated, but not much).

Don't get me wrong, Ben is still really busy. As an entrepreneur/small business owner, there's always more that could be done. There's the mandatory list of broken equipment that needs a lot of TLC. With all the equipment it takes to farm 1,400 acres and the amount of hours the equipment runs during the year, it's a long list (especially this year). Ben and his dad do basically all maintenance and repairs themselves - it takes a lot of time but worth it for the cost savings. There's also the second list of things that would be really nice to do (usually modifications to fieldwork equipment), and they try to pick a couple off that list each year. Plus all the office work it takes to run a farm all gets done right now - taxes (bleh), informational seminars, purchasing all the inputs for the upcoming year, etc.

A few weeks ago Ben and I talked and actually set his work hours so that we are on the same page, versus just willy nilly every day. It's really nice to set your own schedule, but also really necessary so we can fully-utilize this family time. Now I know to expect him home around 5:30 to 5:45 so we can have dinner and some family time in the evening. Molly goes to bed at 6:30 (transitioning from two naps to one has been hard for her), so this way she always gets some daddy time before bed.

It's one of the bitter-sweet things about being a farmwife - we don't get much normal family time during the parts of the year when it would be nice to do outdoor activities, but yet it makes the dreary part of the year a whole lot sweeter.

Focusing on the "sweet" of the bitter-sweet right now.

Ice fishing on Pleasant Lake = winter family fun

This calls for ice cream!

We all know food can be therapeutic. We recently had two back-to-back reasons for ice cream - one good and one not-so-good.

The guys went to an equipment auction last month. My father-in-law's combine hasn't been doing well at all. Ben says there are many days when he sees him drive off to the edge of the field and he says on the CB, "What's wrong with it now?!" 

They had great luck at the auction. Got a new-to-us combine that's definitely an upgrade from the other one and it was a really good price with 0% financing for three years. Ice cream #1. 

Looks especially nice since it's super shiny!

Less than a week later they were cleaning everything up to put it away until next year. It's the most despised day of the year because of how gross everything is and how long it takes to get it all clean. 

My father-in-law went to put Ben's combine away and didn't realize the auger was out - he must have unknowingly bumped the lever when he was cleaning out the inside. Screeeeeeeeech. The auger hit the side of the shop. Not a good day for Ben's combine. Ice cream #2. 

Add that to the already-long list of winter projects - fixing the auger. 

Where have I been...?

So I realize that I've been terribly absent from blogging. Not to mention that I've totally skipped sharing about the highlight of the farming year - harvest.

I have my reasons.

Summer is always busy. This year's had several special items:

• Rose started school so we were spending a lot of time preparing (half day schedules work great for the kids but are a little complicated for working and childcare schedules) and "welcoming" events with her. I was just as giddy as she was - I loved school!
• We enjoyed a couple annual family vacations to northern Wisconsin (Clover Leaf Lakes with my side of the family and the Willow Flowage with Ben's side).
• We hosted Molly's first birthday party at our house in late August (i.e. cleaning and cooking). 
• Ben and I had a couple weekend get-a-ways. First to my cousin's wedding in the Twin Cities and second was a late anniversary trip to Madison to re-trace the steps of our early dating and take in a Badger football game and Tim Hawkins comedy show.
• Sad item of the summer was that my best friend moved back to her hometown. So happy for her and her family, but such a difficult adjustment to not be just a quick drive away anymore.

So excited for school!

Molly <3's dirt cake!

By Monona Bay - site of our first
date and later Ben proposed. 

Then the gray cloud of the past few months and a BIG reason I've been "silent" is that I basically had postpartum depression. "Aren't you a year late" you might ask? It was triggered by weaning Molly from nursing (I made it to a year!). My hormones went cRaZy! It was a really wild ride for about two months or so. I am really grateful for a few things through it - I recognized what it was pretty early on so I could cope with it better, re-affirmed that I have some amazing people in my life, gave me a very "real" experience of leaning on God and finding joy in Him despite my circumstances, and it gave me such a perspective on what others with various forms of depression are dealing with so I can love and encourage them so much better now than I could have before.

Fall - love/hate season. It's so beautiful and so fun to harvest the crops and see the results of the full year of planning and preparation. It's also the same time as Ben's other favorite past-time - bow hunting. So harvest + bow hunting = Nicole is a single parent. I wouldn't trade it for anything though. I fully knew this was who Ben was before I married him - it's who he is. He wouldn't be my husband if he didn't hunt and farm. 

Lastly, I recently transitioned jobs. I'm sad to leave the Wisconsin FFA Foundation. It was six years of blood, sweat and tears mixed with such success, reward and personal growth. I'll never be very far from FFA though - I'll certainly be back at the convention and keep in touch with various people. Three weeks into my new job and I am really enjoying it! I'm my own business entity contracting with Beck Ag for projects as a market contact specialist. It gives me a sense of entrepreneurship that I love, along with working with a well-established, top-notch, values-driven company.  

Through the past few months and all the above happenings, I almost gave up on blogging. Actually, I did make the decision to give it up. I was frustrated at my inconsistency. Also, I have a tons of ideas for the blog, but I have a lot of responsibilities that take priority over it so it's hard for me to settle for it being less than my best (sorry, little perfectionist tendency). It was Ben's encouragement that something is better than nothing. If he's my only fan, then I'm okay with that because he's my most important.