Wind Energy and Ranching: Perspective from a Farm Transition Story
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Good morning. I'm Pete Farrell. I live south of Beaumont, Kansas in the Flint Hills. I'm a fourth generation rancher. I'm fortunate to have a wind farm here. We've been discussing pros and cons of the development of wind farms on agricultural properties.
Ladies and gentlemen, farmers, ranchers, and distinguished guests, thank you for listening to the Farm for Profit podcast, where we discuss the latest ideas, methods, trends, and techniques available to help your farm achieve higher levels of farm profitability. Remember, if you aren't farming for profit, you won't be farming for long.
Well, hey, listeners, welcome back to an episode of the Farm for Profit podcast. We're excited to have you join us. We appreciate you each and every episode. As a reminder, if you have topics or ideas that you want to send our way, hit us up at farmforprofitllc at gmail.com. Send us a text message or give us a call, 515-207-9640. Just got a text message yesterday asking if we could come DJ a party, surprise 30th birthday party for a gentleman's wife. I'm not sure that was one of you guys or not, but not a fit for us and probably not a fit for our guest in this episode today. But thank you so much for listening. Again, share us with your friends and family. Please leave us a review. Apple Podcasts and Spotify are two of the major places as well as YouTube that help us out an absolute ton. We're going to tackle a topic that sometimes appears to be controversial in the realm of agriculture and also in the realm of energy production. So excited to have our guest today, Pete, all the way from the ranch. How's Pete doing today?
I'm warm and vertical, Tanner. That's always a good way to start the day. Yeah.
I love that. And I don't know if I would have expected a different answer from you or not. That definitely seems to fit your personality. And your last name's pronounced Ferrell?
Ferrell. F-E-R-R-E-L-L.
Yeah.
Awesome. So where is your ranch? Where are you coming in from today?
We live 50 miles east of Wichita in the Flint Hills of Kansas, which is renowned as being the tall grass prairie, the last stand of the great tall grass prairie. Used to extend up into your area, you know, decades ago. But anyway, the only reason this place wasn't plowed is it's too rocky. Right.
So what does your ranch look like these days? Because you used to run quite a few head of cattle yourself, and now you've developed a relationship with a young farmer or a young rancher that you're giving an opportunity to.
That's correct. I managed the ranch up until about – Well, it's been a phase-out process beginning in 2017. I started a management company 20 years ago that has leasing rights to this ranch. We have a five-year evergreen lease with the management company. And the management company owns everything you'd sell at a farm sale except the farm. So all the livestock, all the equipment, consumables, some cash. And this young man who's quite amazing, in my opinion, John Wagner, took an interest in this. And so he is now buying that management company. And so he would be the first non-family member to manage the ranch since its inception in 1888 by Wagner. My great-grandfather founded the place, and I'm the fourth generation of the family to run it. But now John Wagner is running it through this arrangement, and it's so far working out quite well.
Eighteen eighty eight. That's a long run for an operation. We know we celebrate century farms here in the state of Iowa, but it's always neat to hear the history of how things got started. So would that be your great grandpa that started that?
That's correct. My great grandfather, he was he was orphaned during the Civil War and was one of those kind of rags to riches story stories. He learned Morse code. He was the first telegraph operator in Council Grove. He was the first telegraph operator in Wichita, Kansas. He was kind of a founding father over there. But he had an amazing story where he just kind of figured out, you know, he figured out how to fix watches. He was selling apples. He was a merchant. And eventually he put his holdings into this ranch. He kind of seemed to consolidate everything he had into this place where I now live. My wife and I live in the house that he built 100 years ago. So we have... We have deep roots here, Tanner.
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