A beginning farmer says riding in the neighbor’s buddy seat during harvest was his first step toward farm ownership.
Zach Wagner tells Brownfield, “My parents had 86 tillable acres, and they rented it out to the neighbor.”
“When I was young, my favorite day of the year was when they showed up to harvest the field,” he reflects. “I got to ride in the combine, and ever since then I just knew that I wanted to farm.”
He says 4-H projects and joining a harvest crew after high school helped to build savings.
The 33-year-old’s first crop was soybeans on 14 acres stretched across four fields that no other farmers in the area were using.
“I had one tractor and I used to hook and unhook implements for several years to farm ground with one tractor, and it took me forever to get anything done,” he shares.
Wife Ronna, 29, says the couple built capital by providing custom harvesting services to farmers in their region and expanding when they could.
“It kind of helped being able to jump to more acres because we already have the equipment for it, we could just kind of transition out of custom work and continue to grow the acres,” she explains.
Michigan Farm Bureau has named the Wagner’s as this year’s Young Farmer Achievement Award winners.
Today, they raise corn, soybeans, wheat, and beef cattle across 3,600 acres in Clinton County.
