Barn Talk - Barn Talk Q&A: How Much Money Do Hog Farmers Make, Best Investing Platform For Stocks, Farm & Brand Goals

Episode Date: November 12, 2021

Welcome To Barn Talk! In today’s episode, we have a Barn Talk Q&A where we answer your questions about.. How much money do hog farmers make, the number one goal for our farm, the best investment platform to invest on, deep pits vs lagoons for manure, how to pass down a generational farm intact and the number one brand goal for This’ll Do Farm/Barn Talk.. SUBSCRIBE TO THE PODCAST ➱ https://bit.ly/3a7r3nR SUBSCRIBE TO THIS’LL DO FARM ➱ https://bit.ly/2X8g45c SUBSCRIBE TO BARN TALK CLIPS ➱ https://bit.ly/3BlZnqq LISTEN ON: SPOTIFY ➱ https://open.spotify.com/show/3icVr4KWq4eUDl7Oy60YMY ITUNES ➱ https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/barn-talk/id1574395049 ADD US ON: INSTAGRAM ➱ https://bit.ly/3gaobdN TIKTOK ➱ https://bit.ly/3eJfftr ------------------------------- ***PLEASE NOTE*** Barn Talk is a significant break from the typical content viewers have come to expect from This’ll Do Farm. Please be advised that we will be exploring a wide variety of topics (some adult-themed) and our younger viewers (and their parents) should be advised that some topics will be for mature audiences only. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Okay, flights on Air Canada. Where'd you want to go? The Azores? For its hot springs and volcanoes? Hmm, speaking of volcanoes, what about Japan? Hmm, you know I love sushi. Not as much as I love tapas. Maybe, Majorca.

We could hit the beach, then go hiking. Hiking? Or how about a seaside stroll in Sicily? Ooh, I do love canolies. Wait, what do you think of... With a world of destinations to choose from. Good luck picking just one. Air Canada.

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so I can stress less during tax season, or any season. Plan started just $12 a month. Learn more at tellus.com slash online security. No one can prevent all cybercrime or identity theft. Conditions apply. That'd be cool too. And, you know, the other thing with that, too, is it really does, with that goal and that dream, it would really bridge the gap. It bridge the gap between the consumer and the farmer.

Because everything that we're doing for our brand, and there's a ton of farmers out there doing the same thing we are, is to bridge that gap. Our mission is to bridge the gap between farmers and consumers and show people where their food comes from. and kind of... Well, restore the faith that... And your fellow farmer and shit. Because there's so many, unfortunately,

there's a lot of organizations out there that paint farmers in a bad light and say we're all corporate owned and say that we don't care. We don't give a shit about what goes into the food or what goes into the animal and we don't give a shit about what goes on to our fields. We're poison in the water.

Yeah. And we don't care about runoff or anything like that. When, We do care because this, everything we're doing is going to go to our, the next generation. You're one of these people that they paint you to be, you won't be raising pig. Right. You won't be feeding cattle. You won't be raising chicken.

All of the food we eat and much of the clothing we wear comes from plants and animals that are raised on farms. Farms are different in type, in size, and even in name. Welcome to Barn Talk. What happens at the barn stays at the barn? garage edition. So maybe what everything that happens, maybe everything that happens at the barn will have to stay in the barn until spring

because it got too dang cold and the building budget didn't provide for getting the barn insulated and heated for winter. So we had to migrate we had to migrate down to Sawyer's garage. Yeah, it was kind of a, I was a little iffy about the decision because it kind of, you

you know, the whole point of us calling it Barn Talk was to shoot it in the barn. But this is our first year doing it, as you guys know. And that barn that we shoot the podcast in is not insulated. There's no heater in it. So it gets really hot in the summer, as you guys saw. And we never have done a winner there. But the last episode we shot up there with a guest, the guest was pretty much shivering. And we were kind of shivering.

And we were just like, you know what? no guests want to come up here and freeze their ass off while they're doing a podcast. So we made an executive decision to move it into this warm garage. And we're going to do some major, major improvements on the barn this winter. We're hoping that we can maybe do something to help keep the heat in so that we can record the podcasts in the winter next year. But this will have to do for now. This will do if you watch our other YouTube channel, it's called This Will Do Farm. And our mentality is kind of like, you know, use what you got to get the job done.

And that's what we're doing here with this garage. So we're not going to stay here forever. This is kind of a part-time studio for now. But it'll get the job done. And we just asked if you guys get any value from this show at all. Share it out with your friends. Share it out with your family. Share it out with your coworkers.

It's a ticket to admission to watch or listen to the show, kind of a value exchange. So I think a lot of people have been doing a good job by doing that. We've been growing slowly but surely, and people seem to really enjoy it. So please, please, please, and thank you for the people that have done it. Yeah, we're trying, we're learning. We're learning as we go and we're trying to give you some value. And I think there's a lot of people out there that kind of share the same viewpoint that we have. Not that that's a prerequisite because I like hearing other people's viewpoint.

But anyway, if you like what you're here, if you like what you hear, gosh, if you like what you hear, share it out. So I'm going to give you the market update. And it's been a pretty good week market-wise. Harvest is getting close. But in our area, there's a lot of people that didn't get their beans. out before the weather changed. And we got, we got like five inches of rain last week. And that's really slowed down the guys that are trying to finish up.

And there is a lot of corn, when I say a lot, I don't know how much there is. There might be 20% or 25% maybe left. And, man, some of it, some of it does not look good. Some of it's terrible laying on the ground. So I feel for those guys, because I, Picking corn with a reel is no, it's no fun. No. If you guys watch Millennial Farmer at all, he's been doing that a lot.

I don't know if you bought a reel. I don't think he bought a reel. I couldn't tell, though, but he's been pretty much picking corn on the ground. Real slow. Real slow. Two and a half miles an hour. Yep. Not fun, but.

And some of those, a lot of it's probably 1197. You got to pick that early. You got to pick 1197 early. It does really good yield, but from last, we had that problem last year. were so dry, the stocks just don't hold up worth of crap. Yeah, this year was better. This year was an excellent year for us, and it did really good, but we also got it early, and it's not one that you want to leave out there until the snow flies.

Anyway, so corn locally. Mark it was down a little bit today, but it was up pretty big the last two days, and actually was up last Friday, too, as far as that goes. So the local bid, the best local bid I could find was 565 locally at one of the feeders, and 571 in Cedar Rapids. Soybeans, 1352 at Quincy. Actually, that's not right. I faux pod that.

It's 1252 at Quincy. Fopod. Yeah. is faux pa have anything to do with foobar well foobar a foe paw is like when you say something you shouldn't have said foobar is when it's messed up beyond all recognition so no uh 1252 at quincy i don't know my fat fingers i hit the three evidently but when i was printing this out uh and 1249 at cedar rapids hogs are 75 I don't know what's going on in the hog market. I didn't read Jim Long's commentary,

and I should have done that before we started. But that's not a good price if you're paying $5.65 for corn and you're selling hogs for $74 $100 a weight. I don't think that computes very well. So we might have to do a little digging in that. Always good to be a contract grower at this time. Well, it is good, as long as that check clears every first of the month. month. It did clear this month, so we're good for another 30 days anyway. Cattle 130.

It's been a pretty good week for all the securities and currencies that we hold near and dear to our heart. Bitcoin has been on a run. Bitcoin's kind of consolidating right here around $60,000, $63,000 today, give or take is where it's at. And it's just been kind of sitting here. here since it made its run up and a lot of people think that it's going to explode yeah it's going to take off and hit 100k by the end of the year and maybe it does i don't it's one of those things to me it's just a it's just going to be a gradual grind higher because as the world as the world kind of figures out feels its way through it and you get more people adopting it and you're and it's happening it is happening look if you really follow bitcoin you can just ever

every day there's a new article, a new story of a foreign country adopting it or thinking about adopting it or a major bank thinking about adopting it or some some persons changed their mind on Bitcoin that was doubting it in the beginning. I mean, there's all kinds of El Salvador's building 20 new schools in the country with profits from Bitcoin. Yeah, they've made out pretty well. Yeah, I was interested to see how that was going to play out. And so far, it seems like they're doing pretty well for themselves as a country going away from a dollar. So. The adoption's going pretty well. And they've had some problems with just a volume of transactions.

But it looks like they're getting that worked out. And so one of the big news stories from last week was that MasterCard came out. And they announced that if you're an issuer of a card that is on the MasterCard system, and you have done some type of reward. So say you have a, say I, this is just a hypothetical, but say you have, say Best Buy has a MasterCard. I think Best Buy actually uses a Visa, but say they do a MasterCard and you earn points. Today, you know, you earn those points and they give you, you know, coupons, money back. But MasterCard announced that they're going to allow all of their issuers to make Bitcoin as a reward.

So in other words, somebody like Best Buy or somebody else, they could make the reward that for every so many dollars you spend, you get a Shatoshi or you get a percentage of Bitcoin back. Kind of like what cash app card does. They have a deal where, you know, you spend $50 at a restaurant, you get $5 back in Bitcoin or something like that. So anyway, that's a big deal because that network is huge. And so, you know, like we said, the adoption, it's happening. And it's just going to be interesting to see how that affects the price and how fast that adoption goes.

Anyway, Ethereum's 4,500. Damn, I wish I bought some of that. I mean, I don't, what was it? I mean, hell, it was $22,000, not even a year ago. Yeah, it was less than that. Probably less than that. I have had a little, I've had some trouble getting my Coinbase account set up. I don't know if anyone else out there.

I'm sure there's somebody out there. but son of a gun Coinbase support is terrible. I've been trying to hook up my bank account to Coinbase. It's a great company. They're on the forefront of crypto exchanges, but son of a bitch, you guys got to get your customer service figured out

because I couldn't link my bank account to save my butt, and that's why I couldn't buy Ethereum. I buy all my Bitcoin on Cash App, and I think that's in the same boat too. Magnus, the Bitcoin miner, was on the podcast. If you guys listen to that, he also buys all his Bitcoin. when he buys it he buys it on cash app so yeah it's it's really weird because the account that i use

um that i that i buy crypto through it's the same local bank that soyer uses and i was able to get my account to link and my in my buddy too kale shout out to you kale you got yours linked up too and i don't know i don't know what i think you i don't know i think it's i've had that a bank account for a long time and I think when I started it's a joint account you signed off on it when I was I don't know when I was young when I started first making money and they say that that shouldn't be a problem and that that's no big deal but that our local banks tech is well it local banks tech isn't that great anyway if you're in a small town I mean it's just you can't expect them to be savvy as hell but and they're very they're very worry about security so they they err on the side of not

allowing anything that looks somewhat fishy. Anyway, long story short, I got to get that figured out. I need either open another bank account somewhere to get linked up so I can buy some Ethereum because it's going to go higher. Yeah, and I think at some point, I think Cash App will probably have Ethereum. That'd be nice. I think they're working on it. And then, near and dear to my heart, Tesla, Tesla closed today at $1,172.

dollars and so if you you know if you're a if you're a frequent watcher of the podcast you we you know we talk about it every week and it's been you know 600 800 it got down to 500 um but they signed a deal with hertz actually that's not true the deal isn't signed because everybody's making a big deal about that today they have an agreement with hertz to sell them 100 000 teslas and then hertz in turn has an agreement with uber that they're going to rent at at least 50,000 of these out to Uber drivers. What's Hertz do? Because some people don't know. So Hertz used to be the largest car rental place there was. When I was a kid, Hertz, it was

Hertz, and that was it. Like, they owned the car rental business. And then, like a lot of companies, they weren't very well managed and they lost their way. And the competition got better and they got worse and they went bankrupt. And they were purchased out of bankruptcy by a venture capital group and now then they're back going and I think they're on the right path and they've made a made the decision to purchase 100,000 Teslas which is excellent for it's not a big deal for Tesla in the fact that somebody's buying 100,000 cars because that on the surface that sounds really good but it's not a big deal because Tesla sells every car they build. In other words, they don't have dealerships.

Every car that Tesla makes, it's already sold. Right. And if you get on their website, the waiting time for some of their models is getting to be, I don't know, nine months. Yeah. So they are demand constrained. In other words, it's not like they're looking for somebody to buy the next car that comes off the line. they're already sold. So the idea that they made this deal with Hertz,

it isn't so important that way. What's really important to it is it's going to give them, it's going to give them the publicity or the exposure where people who wouldn't normally have the chance to drive a Tesla, they're going to be able to go, well, heck, I'll try a Tesla. And then in turn... They'll go zero to 60 in two seconds and get $1.

flown back into the sea and realize, holy shit, that's pretty insane. Yeah. I don't know if you guys know this. No, you probably don't know this, but my girlfriend, Kat, bought a Tesla. She bought a Model 3, long range. And she had a Toyota Corolla, and it had so many freaking problems. I mean, she'd had this thing since high school. And, you know, great car lasted for a long time.

But she drives to, she drives 30 minutes to work every day. And it wasn't worth of shit in the winter. And I was like, you just got to get a Tesla. You just got to get a Tesla. You know, I'm telling her all this thing. And Dad's in her ear, too, because we just, we like Tesla. And never thinking that she'd actually buy it, because now that I'm insanely jealous. Yeah, Dad gets a little pissed when she goes out of the driveway.

But anyway, she bought one and let me tell you, yeah, everyone bashes on Tesla. I'll never drive a Tesla. I'll never get a Tesla. Go drive a Tesla. Go drive one. and put that freaking pedal to the floor and see see how i know i know people love the engine you love to hear the engine it's so nice and i'm not saying that there's not a place for gas combustion vehicles or you know old school muscle cars obviously those that needs to stay but man it's different

it's just a different experience and just the features of a tesla there's just shit in that car that you wouldn't even think that needs to be in a car but it's in there and it's just so cool everything it to the T is just little details that make the experience better than driving a regular car. I mean, it just, it simply is. It really is. And I'm being, I'm not, I'm not, I'm trying not to be biased because I went in with an open mind when I got in it and then I drove it and I rode in it and I was like, wow. And everybody she's shown the car to that was, was not about it, ends up kind of liking it. Yeah, it's, it's impressive. I mean, it just is. Um, so anyway, long story short, um, The stock is at a new all-time high.

Not sure how far this run is going to go, but that partnership between Tesla Hertz and Uber, you can already kind of see the handwriting on the wall there that Tesla is going to get more involved in the taxi side of things. And then what has a lot of these analysts pretty excited about it is the full self-driving side, the software side, side of the car where you're trying to get to the point where you wouldn't necessarily need hands on the wheel at any time for the car to take you where you need to go. That's basically a

math problem and the way you solve that is with huge amounts of data and every car they sell collects that data. And so now it's it's just a time. It's just a time thing. Robotacties are coming. Yeah, and when they do the upside, some people estimate that market could be $9 trillion. So if you are an Uber driver out there, shout out to you because we wouldn't be everybody in their freaking dogs take an Uber and you get us to where we need to go when we're hammered. But buy a Tesla, buy a Tesla. So you can hedge your bet because what's going to happen is the drivers are no longer going to drive. and if you own the Tesla, I'm pretty sure you could probably hop on the Uber app

if they transition to do Robotaxies and you could just have your car working for you. Yep, while you're doing something else. While you're doing something else. So that's just a thought. But today's going to be a Q&A episode. We have kind of a long market update, but we're just amped tonight.

It's a night episode and we got the beers flowing and ideas flowing through our brain. But yeah, Q&A, we asked some questions on our Instagram, YouTube channels. I ask the questions on this will do farm, Instagram and YouTube, and I do it on Barn Talk and Barn Talk Instagram, because, you know, most people kind of commingle in both those audiences and we have people, you know, just curious to ask us questions.

So if you guys want to submit a question, go to our Instagram, hit the follow button, and next time you see a poll on our story, send us a question or write it down the comments or I'll do something on YouTube too that you can write your comments on, but we'll get them. So dad and I are going to answer three to four questions each, and we might have a bonus question at the end. So I'm going to start with dad. Dad, to someone looking to build a hog barn, how much income can one hog barn make after all expenses are paid for in here?

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Download the app and get groceries just how you like with Instacart. When a country's productivity cycle is broken, people feel it in their paychecks, their communities, their futures. What does this mean for individuals, communities, and businesses across the country? Join business leaders, policymakers, and influencers for CGs national series on the Canadian Standard of Living, Productivity, and Innovation. Learn what's driving Canada's productivity decline and discover actionable solutions to reverse it. Yeah, so that's a huge, there's a lot of variables in that. If you're going to borrow 100% of the money, say you've got equity,

say you've got a chunk of dirt or something that you can use for equity, where you're Can I stop you for a second? Yep. Let's do one, let's do an example of the first time you build the barn. Yep. And then after it's paid for. Yeah. Okay.

So if you've got the equity and you're going to go build it and you're not going to put any money in it, today, um, you're probably looking at financing that barn for 15 years. And you would be lucky if you would clear after all expenses paid, I would be, be surprised if you would clear more than you'd be lucky if you could clear a thousand bucks a month yeah and if you are somebody that's thinking about building a barn you're going to have to do to work yourself there's no hiring it out if you want to make money i mean yeah if you want to make money yeah like to pay yourself a little bit but now now now there's some things that play into that because these companies that are looking to get contract growers one thing that's

that they will use in their cash flows, they will use, so if you're a farmer, if you are taking the manure from that building and you're applying it to your crop ground, they will use a number for the value of the manure. And that's fine if you can utilize the manure. But if you're just giving that manure away to somebody because you don't own the ground that is receiving it,

then it's of no advantage to you. you. Excuse me. And then the other thing is you have to, you have to take that, the value of that manure versus the value of purchasing the nitrogen, purchasing the fertilizer. Now then, going into this, going into this following crop year, this upcoming crop year, the manure I have in my pits, that's like gold. Because when you have nitrogen that's a dollar a unit, manure looks yeah I look at that manure and that's a great value because I'm paying maybe um maybe I'm paying 1.3 cents a gallon I don't know what it'll end up being it might be a little bit higher than that um to pump it and haul it to pump it and haul it drag line it um and if your manure

for rough numbers say your manure's 50 pounds of nitrogen per thousand gallons you're putting you're putting 4,000 gallons on to get your 200 pounds of nitrogen, which you can only really ask for 80% of that the first year. I'm getting off. But anyway, so there's definitely a value there. But you can only count that value if you're the one that's going to grow the crop. Yeah. So if you're not, you're going to have to pay for the hauling anyway.

So that's an expense too. No, if you're giving it away, somebody will pay to get it to get the manure. But you're not getting any benefit of it. And then the other thing is if you're doing wean to finish, you've got the overstock money. So if your integrator does it that way. Yeah, if your integrator does it that way. But, you know, $12,000 maybe on a barn.

So it's not a get rich quick thing. It's a get. It's a build wealth thing. It's a build wealth slowly thing. Now then the flip side of that is, if that barn's paid for after expenses, you can probably clear $100,000 a year off that barn. and just go over like an average how much they pay a pig space like you know you know a lot of integrators

so you don't have to just do our integrator but kind of just example of what yeah so the easy for anybody that wants to play along at home and do the math so you've got people that are paying and this is we're talking about 2,400 this isn't a 12 we're going to just rock with a 2,400 head barn that's pretty standard across the industry um you know that's a kind of what most people build. Some people build something a little bigger than that, but 2,400 is where most people are at. And so, you know, a feeder pig barn, I'd say today, the bottom end of rent is going to be $36 a pig space. The high end of feeder pig, maybe 39. And then all of that depends on what is included as far as what kind of equipment they want.

So like somebody might be wanting you to have bin scales and a, a smart control and for that they're going to pay you more versus somebody that doesn't require that and they're going to pay you less. And then you go to a wean to finish barn where you're basically you're getting paid for the extra labor of picking up every one of those pigs and giving them a shot and the extra heat because you're going to be filling a barred with small pigs in the wintertime at some point and your heating cost is greater. So those barns usually run, I'd say the bottom end of them, $42. The high end, maybe 43 or 44. A pig space. A pig space. And there again, dependent on the cost of the building. So the more expensive that building is

by the integrator's spec, the more they're probably going to pay you. But at the end of the day, what you clear when you're paying for the barn is going to be roughly similar because the cost is going to be, you know, higher. You're getting paid more, but the cost is higher. Yeah. So, yeah, if you, and this is if you're doing it all yourself. Yeah, let's talk a little bit about, like, triple net leasing. Yeah.

And so like he said, $100,000, you can probably clear $100,000 if you're taking care of a barn. If you're, if you're taking care of the barn, you got a son, you got somebody to help you load, you can do all the work, you can probably clear $100,000. I mean, you still got expenses in there, though. Yeah, you do. Yeah, but if you're somebody that, you know, you actually pay the barn off, you've done your 10 to 15 years of labor and you're like, man,

I finally got this thing paid for. Now I can go do something else and I can hire this done. You can do something like Triple Net Leasing, which is the integrator will pay you less per pig space and they'll handle, they'll find somebody to do it and they'll pay that employee to chore your barn and they'll handle all the loading, all the power washing, all the vicaration, all the vicar vaccinating. Basically, you can, it's kind of, it, in southeast Iowa where we're located, there is enough integrators doing it that it's kind of an al-a-cart thing. So I'll just say, in my experience, when I was doing contracts and working with growers, we did contracts where

we did everything, including mowing the grass and moving snow in the winter, down all the way to the grower did everything. But you can just figure roughly $6 a pig space is about the going rate if you're going to have somebody chore your barn and chore it, power wash it, load the pigs, and then you would pay utilities and everything. Utilities, mowing the grass, snow, power, and get somebody in there to do repairs. Six bucks. Then we had people that did.

not a true triple net lease where we took $12 and we paid the utilities. We paid all the utilities and we supplied all the labor. The owner was still required to take care of repairs. And then it was negotiable about Moan and Snow. If it was somebody close to kind of their home base, they might do it for 50 cents of pig space or 25 cents of pig space. And the other other thing with that is you don't have to go through the integrator to hire somebody to take care of your barns. If you want to manage the person that you can hire somebody to do it and you just pay them out of your pocket and you can kind of negotiate yourself what that person does and how much they get. If they get the overstocks, if you're doing a wean to finish or, you know, you get half and they get half.

I mean, you can kind of do it all all you want. But the number is what you pay them, how much a pick space to take care. if you're paying somebody. If you're six bucks. Six bucks. Six bucks a pig space. So it's about $12,000 a barn is kind of the, right? Is it 14.4.

14. I don't know. 14. I think it's 14.4. 144 to have somebody do it. That's kind of the number. Now, this is where I'll put my integrator hat on. So if you're a young kid trying to chore some barns and they tell you four bucks of pig space or five bucks, tell them to shove,

freaking sandwich down their throat because of trying to screw you over. Well, but there again, that's all, so there's people that pay somebody five bucks a pig space to do it, but they got a wash crew so they don't have to pay the power washing. Right. Or they pay them $4.25 and they got a wash crew and they got a load crew. And they're literally just paying them to chore it every day. Yeah, and if you're the guy that gets hired by somebody to chore a barn, more than likely you're going to have to be in charge of paying for that kind of stuff. loading, power washing, vaccinating, more than likely, unless you work out terms with the guy that you're torn for, because it is negotiable, you know.

But now here's the one thing that I want everybody to understand, because I think there's people within the industry that own barns that I don't even know if they understand this always until it's a problem. So the one thing to keep in mind, unless you're doing a triple net lease, where you have signed an agreement that the integrator is responsible for all of those things. If you have the contract and the contract states that you are responsible for daily care of those pigs and you turn around and you hire somebody to do it, be very careful with that because your name is on the contract. And if there is a problem, if there is, it's your ass.

If there is neglect, if there is somebody that abuses a pig on loading it, or if there is somebody there that does a terrible job, does a terrible job, doesn't respond to an alarm call, and you have a barn of pigs that die, or they're pumping the pit, and they're supposed to let, there's all kinds of things that can happen. And at the end of the day, if your name's on the contract and Joe Blow, you hired to do it, and he doesn't do his job,

they're not coming to look for Joe Blow. They're coming for you, and you're the one that's responsible. So that's one thing where a triple net lease, if you're an absentee person or you build one of these barns and you basically want the manure, yes, you can probably net more money if you pay the utilities yourself and you hire somebody to do it,

but you're also shouldering a lot more liability where if you sign a triple net lease, you literally are hands off and you give up some money, but you also gain a safety net where you don't have that responsibility. Yeah, and I want to touch on something. So on the flip side of that,

if you are the person that, let's say you got a young kid at home that you're a dad's situation. You have a son that comes back in farms and you got barns that he can take care of and you hire him. Or you're just somebody that wants, wants to shoulder that more risk, you don't have to spend so much and you can pocket more cash. You should really consider maybe not paying them the cheapest you can possibly pay them

because another big thing is as the barn owner, if you're paying somebody, and this is what we've been seeing in the industry, I mean, we talk to people and they got guys hired and they don't take care of the maintenance issues as much because guess what, it's not their barn and you're paying them the cheapest you can pay them. And all they're thinking is I got to just take care of these pigs. Oh, that's a leaking nipple. Well, I didn't really see that today. And I don't continue to see that.

Or the feed hoppers leaking feed out of it. Oh, that's fine. It's not my barn. And they don't let you know that. Well, then your barn goes to shit over time. And so you got to watch that. It might not be the best idea to pay somebody the lowest you can pay them because if you say, hey, I'll pay you more,

but you need to be better about maintenance. You either let me know or you need to fix it or work out a deal or they got to pay for maintenance if you pay them more or whatever. But that barn is your asset. And the better care you can, the better you can take care of that, the longer it will last for you, the longer it'll cash flow money for you. And the longer you can go without having to do major, major repairs. Yeah, because the hog, a hog building does not make you money on the front end. It makes you money on the back end. So the better care you can take care of it while you're paying for it, the more valuable and the better cash flow you'll get at the end when you're getting all that money.

And so that's something that we try really hard to do is take the best care we can of the barns we have. So my first barn is 11 years old and it's paid for. and it has the original curtains, the original gates. Slats, original. We have not had to put much money. I mean, a few fan motors, this, that, whatever. Gate posts. And we're just now having to start doing some gate repair.

But it's paid for. And that's a whole different situation. Now think about that. That barn's 11 years old. Sawyer's Barn, he put that on a 15-year note. Mm-hmm. So if you only built one barn and it's on a 15-year note and you've got somebody hired to take care of it and they're not staying up on maintenance and you get to year 10, you get to year 10.

You still have five years left on it before you're racking 100K. And your gates are shot or they're tearing the cups off the thing or your feed system is worn through because it's been running empty because nobody bothers to go pull the slide till the next day. You know how well that cash flows where you have to spend. spend five, $10,000 and the barn's not even paid for, it doesn't work. Yeah, and it's all the little shit. That's right. It is all the little stuff. Just like you said with the feed like that feed line, like, oh yeah, I can wait till next morning to get the feed line full. Well, then it eats through your shit and leaky nipple, your pit goes bad, your slats go bad faster, not epoxy in your barn.

You know, there's so many little things that can really add up on your barn and wear. on your barn. So that was a good, hey, that was a good question. We went really in depth on that one, but that was good. That provided a lot of value, I think. Okay, we're going to shift gears because Sawyer is the, he's the aggressive investor out of the family. So I don't know about that. I think what platform is the best to invest on for stocks and funds? Personally, for me, I talked about this a little bit on our how to build wealth and find financial freedom episode, which is like two episodes ago. I highly recommend we were really in depth on that. But I said that when I was 17, dad and I went to Edward Jones and he kind of led me in the right direction that, hey, you need to

start investing money. And I didn't really know, we both didn't really know what we were doing. We were kind of like, you know, what's just our retirement account. And that's what we did. And I was paying somebody else to do mutual funds. And then I did some research on my own realize index funds outperform mutual funds and it just kind of changed my perspective and if you're somebody that wants to have those that you know mutual funds and have it you know done for you that's totally fine but for me i wanted to shoulder that and do it and i felt like i could do it and so the platform that i moved to is m1 finance i think it's a great platform really easy to use you can have a retirement account on there a roth IRA a regular IRA you can have a

a regular brokerage account where you can invest in stocks or index funds. Self-directed. Self-directed outside of your retirement account. Obviously, that means that it's going to be taxable if you take out the money unless it's in a retirement account. But you can do so much stuff. You can get Vanguard ETFs on there. When I say index funds, I mean ETFs because Vanguard's pretty strict on index funds. You can only invest in Vanguard index funds on Vanguard, but ETFs are pretty much index funds. There's really no difference. There is a difference, but it's not super major. Anyway, you can get all that stuff on M1 finance, and you can't get that stuff really on Robin Hood. I don't think. You can not really invest in funds. You can't get a retirement account on M1,

or on Robin Hood. But M1, it's pretty much like everything is to your disposal, which is really cool. And then also a really good feature of M1 finance is their borrow. It's called M1 borrow. and if you know anything about marginal loans, I talked about this a little bit in that episode two where if you got index funds, you can leverage how much that amount is in that account and use it as collateral to go buy, to go start a business if you want to have a business loan

or to go buy real estate or whatever. And they offer a 30, you can borrow up to 35% of your total amount and you can get it at like a 2% interest rate. and here's how, and this is really cool about M1 borrow. So this is kind of like, it gives the beginner that wants to do marginal loans. It gives the beginner kind of a way to do that because the other brokerages like Fidelity, Vanguard, all these other ones, the lower your, the lower amount that's in that account, that brokerage account,

your interest rate is insanely high. So if you got $50,000 and you want to borrow, against it. You could probably borrow 50%, but it's going to be at like 12%. Yeah, you might as well just go to a bank. Right. It's going to be an insane interest rate. But the more that account builds up with those brokerages, like let's say you get to $10 million, then you can borrow at like a one and a half interest rate up to 50%. But you can't do that if you have a lower amount. But M1, all you need is up to $10,000 to start and get a loan. And they'll give you up to 35% and you can get at a 2% interest rate locked in. So it's a really good way to get started if you're into marginal, want to borrow against your portfolio at a beginner's rate and a really good price rate.

Obviously, you can't borrow 50%. But 35 is, that's pretty good. So I'm super happy with that. I'm super satisfied. I moved all my stuff over to M1 and I got my retirement account on there. I got my individual stocks on there and I got index funds on there outside of my Roth that, or ETFs outside of my Roth. And I've been very pleased, and I'm going to use it until I'm just going to use it for probably ever. Yeah, and you can own individual stocks on there. You can buy and buy and trade.

Yeah, literally, they literally have individual ETFs. They got all kinds of, they got everything that you could possibly want on there, really. They truly do if you're looking into investing. Now, the one thing I'll say since you got off on that on margin, that is one thing we talk about a lot on here is kind of self-responsibility. And if you're going to go down the road

of using a margin account, that's an example of... On there, it's not a marginal account. You don't have to open an account. No, right. You can borrow against your... You can... But you're using margin.

Yeah, you're using... You're using your amount as collateral. Right. So... And there's some responsibility with that because if so there's no guarantee obviously that say your say your your portfolio of stocks and ETFs is worth $50,000 and you go in there and you borrow $25,000 there's no guarantee that the stock market can't crash tomorrow right now that's part of the reason they're not going to let you borrow

more than 50% and maybe they're 35% yeah um because it's not a great not a very likely change that it could drop that much, however it is possible. And so you've got to do your own research. And it isn't something I would recommend unless you're... So the example we used in our podcast was like at real estate. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, if you're somebody that just wants to do with passive investing and you're just doing investing and you don't want to buy real estate,

you don't want to go start a business, you have no need to take out a marginal loan. But then again, I saw somebody. I did watch a YouTube video of a guy that did house renovations with it. And he took a low, low, low marginal loan out that he knew he could pay. He knew he could pay. And that's fine. You can do that. But where are you getting in trouble is there's people that'll take a margin to go buy more stock. They'll speculate on stock and they'll day trade. And that, yeah, right. That is no different than walking into the casino. That's not really smart. I mean, that's not investing. Unless you're an expert, then maybe you can get away with that. And the other thing that I want to throw in on that, yeah, my recommendation, if you're going to borrow against your brokerage account, use a marginal loan, I would strongly suggest not having any individual stocks in that brokerage account. So I open my own, so I have my individual brokerage account, which I have all my individual stocks in. And then I went and opened another brokerage account where I just have all my ETFs in there.

way and it's like the S&P 500 total stock market and then I have an all around the world ETF in there too and those are pretty low risk like with a stock it can be very variable like Tesla volatile yeah it can be volatile it can drop it can go up it can go up it can go up with the S&P it's not really going to go up up up up up up it's not going to like go up one day down very hard the next day go up very hard go down the next day it's kind of been like this for a very very long time. And the other thing that I want to throw in there, so if you're going to do a marginal loan,

I would really just strongly suggest just leveraging your ETFs. If that's what I would do, I would borrow against your ETFs, marginal loan against your ETFs. Not that you're giving advice. No, I, oh, yeah, no, I'm not giving financial advice. This is what I would do.

This is what I'm going to do. And the other thing is, I am not going to do that until I know the, because I know a recession is coming. Everyone knows. Inflation's crazy. Stock market's crazy. Everything's crazy. Housen market's crazy. There's going to be a crash at some point. So I am not going to use a marginal loan until I know we have crashed and we are on the incline back up as an economy.

So I'm just going to build up that brokerage account with my ETFs in there and just build that up, build that up, build that up, build that up, go through the recession. And once we start going back up, then I would recommend that's, well, I'm going to probably borrow against that. But yeah, just weigh out your options. If you're going to do that, I wouldn't recommend using individual stocks and I wouldn't recommend borrowing at a time where it's kind of questionable on what's about to happen in our economy. So you got to be smart about timing and what you got in there. But yeah, that's my two cents on what platform to use and how to use it. I strongly recommend M1 finance.

There's a lot of videos on YouTube about how to use the platform. Talks about marginal loans on there. That's how I got my information on it. So tons of info, great platform, highly recommend. All righty. Dad, Lagoon's versus Slatted Pits. Pros and cons of each. And what's better?

I think, I don't know this 100%, but I'm pretty sure, like, in the state of Iowa, today you cannot build a lagoon for a swine confinement building. I think they've been outlawed. Somebody can correct me on that. The Carolinas, they're the same way. They went away from those. They had a huge flood down there about two decades ago

and had a lot of lagoons that flowed over because they had a hundred year rainfall. They had a hundred year rainfall. had a hundred-year flood and they found out that the what was what was considered the top line the fullest level that you could have the lagoon at was too high in other words there wasn't enough room to take all the water that they got and a bunch of them flowed over and that was a big that was a big mess and um the fallout for that from that was actually there was a moratorium down there um and then in state of Iowa, the DNR, I think if you have a lagoon, and I know a few sites around that have

lagoons, and I think they've got to be inspected, I think they've got to be inspected every couple of years, if not every year now. And I actually think the DNR has some money. They're trying to get people to retire them. So the reason that we went down that road, when we first started of building hog confinements, the idea was that the air quality within the building would be better if you would get all the manure out of the building. So the pits were, they were all poured with a shallow pit like a two-foot gutter underneath each gang of slats. So a lot of the barns were 40 foot wide and you had four gutters and they would go to a three-stage lagoon and, And they would pump what they called gray water or black water off the top of the last lagoon,

and they'd pump that back up and fill the gutter, and then they'd flush it. Every so many days, you'd flush all the manure out of the building. But what people found out was that the air quality really wasn't any better, because when you flushed it, you turned all that manure up, and so it released, it released, chemical. Well, sulfur, that rotten egg smell that manure has. It released all that.

And so the air quality really wasn't much better. And it didn't take very long before, because of the cost of doing the dirt work and the size of land that you needed to build a building and then build the lagoon for it, it got to where the economics of it made it cheaper just to put a concrete storage structure, a pit, an 8 foot or a 10 foot pit,

underneath the slats. And so in the state of Iowa, pretty much the standard for the last, well, I went to work for precision in 2001, and I would say pretty much everything that was built from the early 90s on. A lot of the first confinements

were built in 92. And I'd say pretty much from about 94 or 5 on just about everything that's been built has been total slats. In Iowa, at least. At least in Iowa. Now, I can't say for other places, but I'd say the advantage is cost-wise

and land-use-wise, the deep pit is probably more economical. And then the other part of it is just from just from optics. Yeah, I mean, appearance-wise. Yeah. I mean, no one, if you're not a farmer and you drive by a farm and you see a massive lagoon. Well, you think it's a pond.

Yeah, I mean, it's just people don't like that. People don't like that. And it just doesn't look good. Yeah, and there's a lot. And I think it's the liability, too, because if you were to get, you know, a rain situation, a flood situation, and that and that berm, that lagoon, I mean, they're all, there's a few that were built with concrete storage outside. But most were, what we call an earthen berm, basically. They built a glorified pond, and you had to have the right clay in the bottom of it to keep it from leaching. But, you know, if those, if those degrade and that ruptured, it's a lot of liability.

You have a lot of pissed off neighbors. Yeah, so pretty much, I do. I think everything built today, I don't even think you can build a building with a lagoon. So you don't recommend? I would not recommend it. So the pros outweigh the cons. Yeah, definitely.

Definitely. Okay, well, yeah, I would agree. I don't really like Lagoes. I don't like the image of them. I don't like the idea at all. Yeah. It seemed like a good idea back years ago. Yeah.

And then the recycling of them, the plumbing it takes and the pumps to pump the water, it gets to be a maintenance nightmare. I know a couple people that have sites that do have lagoons. And the amount of upkeep and to keep all that running is, it's a lot. So, Sawyer, if there was one thing you could change or add into your farm with no budget restrictions, what would you add? Hog barns, more acres, or equipment, or fill in the blank? Oh, man. Is there a check for all the above? Because I would do all the above.

This one's hard because, you know, the previous question, the first question we asked Dad, you guys kind of understand how good of a deal a hog barn can be. I mean, that's a lot of cash flow. And we've, I mean, you guys follow us, you know that we wouldn't be here without Dad taking the taking the chance and building his first barn and then building a second and building a third. I mean, the hog barns is what kept us going as a farm.

And I, you know, I built mine and I realized how good of a deal it is. So hog barns are so, so nice, great piece of real estate. And the other thing that I like about hog barns and doing pigs is, yes, you're feeding the world by being a grain farmer. But being a hog farmer, you get to see where that grain goes. too and that really is truly feeding the world because you do take those hogs raise them up and then you do feed the world like we got to do both which is kind of cool um but as far as the need of our farm we dad and i love grain farming just as much as we love hog farming if not more we want to grow the grain farming side of our operation we love hogs we love hog barns we love how much they cash flow

but they're not making more land, not making any more land. And we want to make this farm viable for another generation. And I think we both realize that we're going to need to get some more ground. And we want to get more ground. We want to farm more ground. So, oh, man, I would say buy more ground is kind of what I'm leaning towards. I would buy more ground. Yeah, if money is no object.

Money was no object. Yeah, I'm buying more ground. and hell I'm building a hog barn on one if I get a piece of ground that can put a hog barn on. But yeah, ground, grounds our number one priority right now. Everything that we're doing is to hopefully one day grow our grain farming operation, even though the other two really sound enticing too. Yeah, and don't get me wrong. I would love farm equipment too, but we go back and forth.

We would love to have a wet bin. We'd love to have a grain cart because we could frickin pick and get our, what we have done so much easier. but at the same time we're like, do we really want to go down that road and do all those payments on equipment? It's just a, it's not an asset that's producing you money.

So I'd rather get the assets first than buy the nice shit to go along with it. So you got anything you want to say on that? It's, it's just, it's a tough, it is a tough situation. I mean, anybody in agriculture, we're all in the same boat. Land absolutely does not

cash flow. I mean, it's... Especially right now. And the thing is about... The thing about land is, it's not even a... It's not an investment. It's a selfless investment is what it is. Because basically, if you buy a piece of ground,

it's for your descendants. Because you're never going to see the benefit of it. I'm 50 years old. And if I bought a farm, even if I could... Even if I could buy a farm, take 30 years to pay for it. And we're talking about money's no object.

Obviously, if money was no object, we buy it in cash. But let's be realistic. We're going to go more towards the realistic part and talk about it here. Yeah, go ahead. So you're looking at, if you can swing that to buy it, it's definitely for your descendants because you're not going to get, you're not going to live long enough. Well, you know, maybe you live long enough,

but you're still not going to get the benefit out of it. Hog buildings, you know, they don't cash flow as well, but they will cash flow. And, but kind of where we're at with that, is we've got enough that we can't we're not getting the full benefit out of all the manure that we produce where if we had more land to apply the manure that currently were we're given that that away or we got neighbors that are you know that are taking it and hauling it paying the cost of application and all that um you take a year like this where nitrogen is as high as it is boy if

we could utilize that our cost of production would be better than somebody that's buying commercial fertilizer so it would be a it would be an advantage to us so that i mean but i i agree with soyer 100 you know my whole our whole vision is to to transfer this family farm to another generation in good enough shape and viable enough that the next ones can raise their family um doing what doing some version of what we're doing So that's why we do it. Yeah, and I mean, if you listened to or watched any of the other previous podcast, and we talked about my grandpa,

and I talked about, we talked about dad's story, and it's like, my grandpa had to go fight in World War II, and he didn't get back to the farm until late, and then he had a falling out with his brother. So he had to, like, restart the farm again. So he had a lot of setbacks. And dad, he had a setback in the 90s with the hog market crash. and so you had to kind of fight your way back and, I mean, thank God you did,

because he wouldn't be here where you are now and you wouldn't have never built those hog barns and it was a blessing in disguise. You know, you can agree to that. And Sawyer is nervous as a horror in church because he hasn't really fucked up yet. Yeah. He's just like, oh, shit, what's going to happen? I've tried to hedge my bed at every corner I can, but I just feel like dad and I are here and we're like, you know what, we have the time on our hand.

And we have the time on our side that the past generation didn't really have. And we have a really good relationship where I don't, we would never, we would never go out each other and fight. And, you know, we would never break up this farm. You know, we, we're a good team. And we realize that we can do something that no generation on our farm has ever done. And we take pride in that. And we want to give it to the next generation like that said, but we want to give it to the next generation.

better than how you got it or how I got it. You know, we want to do the best we possibly can. And then we're going to work their little asses off so that they don't piss it away. Because it takes three generations to make a fortune only one to piss it away. Yeah, they're definitely loading hogs at 3 a.m. You damn right there.

Is it my turn or is your turn? I think it's... It's your turn. It's your turn. Yep. Yeah. No, it's my turn to ask you. Right. Okay. Sorry, we're, we're getting, I'm, I'm getting a little tipsy just a little bit. So, uh, dad, what's what's bio cow and is it worth the money? You might have seen, if you follow this, we'll do farm. You might have seen our story or I made a video on it, uh, sometime last year, uh, something we apply on our fields and a lot of people ask about it. And a lot of people ask if it's worth it. So dad, give them the spiel. Um, so this isn't a paid, this isn't a paid, uh, reference or anything. So we,

use a product called BioCow and it's it's sold by a company called Midwestern BioAG and today the the catchphrase regenerative agriculture and soil health and all that that's a hot thing and everybody's talking about it um the company that we get that we get that stuff from they've been doing this for long time they've been doing it for like 20 years 25 years and The guy that started it, he actually doesn't own the company anymore. He sold it. And then an investment company bought them out. And I think that, I think it's actually owned, I think it's actually owned by a holding company, a venture capital company, because they paid a bunch of money for it because of what it was doing. And it's a hot, you know, it's a hot thing now. But they,

they do a lot more than just sell a bio cow, but that's the only product of theirs that we use. There are companies called bioag. Yeah. I don't know if you said that. And they're big in the dairy business. They do a lot with forage and getting, you know, better quality feed for cattle and dairy and all that.

But anyway, so a lot, probably been 10 years ago. It's probably been 10 or 12 years ago. I got introduced to it and I went to a couple of meetings where the guy that started the company spoke and he's very passionate about soil health and biodiversity within your soil and it made a lot of sense to me and what we were doing at that time we were we were chisel plowing and then we were field cullivating. You were doing it the Lawrence way. Yeah, I mean, we were telling, my dad grew up plowing.

I mean, he plowed and plowed and plowed. And, you know, the best soil on this farm probably got washed away two generations ago or a generation ago. But that's what, you know, they didn't know any better. That was what, that was how they thought, that's how they thought it needed to be done. And I guess, listening to that, it really. made me question why we were doing what we were doing we had we were getting very i'd say we were getting below average yields and um do we i just wasn't happy with what we were doing and um so i made a decision to start uh grid basically grid mapping we hadn't done that so we grid mapped all our all our soils

and we started getting soil tests done every three years. And we decided to try BioCal. And what it is, it's a calcium product. And then it has a lot of trace minerals in it too. And the idea of it is, is it feeds, you know, you can lime as far as for pH. But what BioCal does is its intention is to help. help speed up the production of biological activity within your soil, which in turn helps

break down residue faster, which helps your organic matter. And organic matter is what creates, basically what creates soil over time. And it... Welcome aboard via rail. Please sit and enjoy. Please sit and stretch. Steep. Flip. Or that. And enjoy.

Via Rail, love the way. Talk about the manure part of it. Yeah, and then if you're using manure, if you're using a natural form of fertilizer, you know, like for us, hog manure, it really ties into that because it helps that manure break down faster. So you get more, you get more of the value. of that manure the first year.

And it's a multiplying thing where, you know, like any goods, anything that anybody sells you, the longer you use it, the better it gets. Well, I don't know. I mean, I can't sit here and say to you that, you know, we did this and our corn yields went up this percent. I, there are so many variables in that. Yeah, because you did, you did change not just that. You did bio cow, but we also, you built your barns.

It got hog manure. I mean, you kind of always had hog manure, right? Yeah. So we always had hog manure, but we were surface applying for years and years. We surfaced applied it. We just blew it on with a vacuum tank. And we spread it on top. We didn't knife it in.

We didn't do any of that. So when I built buildings, we went to dragline in our manure. We quit chiseling. We went from pretty much maximum tillage to minimum tillage to today. We basically, I mean, I would say, we no-till, but if I said that, all the true no-tellers would say foo-foo on you, because what we do, literally all we do now is... We'll just call it partial till.

Yeah, yeah. So we use, we use, the only piece of equipment that we really use on our crop ground is, it's a Bessler. So it's a mechanical stock chopper that has, it has eight rows of offset blades. blades in a basket that we run that over the stock ground and it pretty much just destroys the root balls and breaks up the stocks and i mean it it does till a little bit it probably tills a quarter of an inch to three eighths of an inch uh where it where those knives hit um but other than that we don't really i would say the drag lining of the manure probably does more tillage than what that Bessler does.

Yep. And that's all we do. So we're using, we're using manure. We use bio cow on all of the acres that are going to corn. It doesn't go on the bean ground. We, we apply lime when we need it.

We apply lime. Today you don't get near the phosphorus out of the manure that you used to. Because phytase, we put phytase in the feed. and the pigs are able to use more of it out of the feed, and so it doesn't go in the pit. They're able to digest it. So we have to put on a little bit of commercial P&K,

and then we're... We did a micro pack this year that had a bunch of... Oron, zinc. Yep. And so all I'll tell you is this. Through trial and error, because I'm definitely absolutely no expert, BioCal was one of the first things that we did.

did and we've been consistent in doing it. We've probably done it for, I don't know, eight years, 10 years, something like that. Time flies. And our yields and the quality of our soil and the amount of erosion we have and the speed at which our crop matter breaks down has gotten better. And when I say better. Significantly better.

Every year. Every year. And this year our yield is the best yield we've ever had. Yeah, and it was a great year. We got rain when we needed it. If it wouldn't have rained, if we would have gone one more week without rain, it wouldn't have been the best year we ever had.

It probably got pretty mediocre. But, you know, the good Lord smiled on us, and we got rain when we needed it. But what I'm saying is, I feel like all the little things that we've done, BioCow included, have helped us. And we're constantly looking. I think, and this is for everything,

that we do here. We try, and I, Sawyer is the same way. We try really hard to not get beholden to our paradigms. Yeah, don't, we don't attach to our beliefs. I mean, you got to have beliefs that make you you, but don't put, box yourself in, don't put you, put yourself on a belief of, oh, no till doesn't work.

No till doesn't work. No till doesn't work. Or whatever. Whatever it is. I mean, because you, the second you stop learning, the second you stop and say, no, I'm just not even going to look at that. I'm not even going to see how that is. I'm not even going to learn and think about how, well, how does that work? Or why do they do that or whatever?

You're going to be behind. You're going to be behind. I mean, it's just the truth. And you got to question, you got to question everything. I mean, you really do. You got to have open eyes, open ears, learn, constantly. learn question things but i mean i went to one of those bio cow meanings i think i want bioag me last year that was the first time dad took me there and it does make sense i mean the guy that he

still speaks and it just makes sense he shows you proof i mean he's not just spitballing this shit he has proof of actual farmers where he went in there and completely changed the outcome of their yields and everything because of because of soil health and i'm not here saying you know waving the soil health flag like that's that's everything and that you should spend every freaking dollar you can on inputs to get your soil health all the way to max because that's just not realistic yeah but do i think if your soil health is good and you do all you apply all the right nitrogen and you do all the right things and you don't mess with the root system if you don't have to and the weather's good that year you got a pretty good chance of probably yielding some damn good

corn. I also think, I'll just say this, that one of the pitfalls that grain farmers run into that is the same as the pitfalls that everybody runs into is we live in a world today where we've got to have everything now. And when you're renting ground, so when you go rent a piece of ground, that ground, it's got to produce because you're paying, you're paying big bucks and you have a tight margin. And so the, you know, you make a budget and you got to spend this, you're going to spend this much on fertilizer, and you've got to try to make that, make that yield to make that payment, to pay that rent, to pay all the equipment. So there's a lot of guys out there that do not have the luxury of building. So, you know, when I start, so we, the first,

the first two or three years that I used bio cow, I think our yield was better, but it wasn't like, holy cow, this is the holy grill. And when you ask what it costs, I should know, but I want to say, when we first started,

we were using a lot, so we're kind of on a maintenance plan now because our levels are a lot better. But I want to say we were spending 30 bucks an acre on it. I think that's about right. think that's somewhere in there, 27 maybe. So it's not cheap. Everybody wants to click fix.

And that's right. Everybody wants to get rich really quick. Everybody wants to know, everybody wants to know the secret that the rich know. Everybody wants to know the secret of how good farmers are good farmers. But the truth is it's probably the long, hard road. The long game, long game. Got to play the long game with everything that you do pretty much. I mean, if you want lasting success and,

good success and great success. Just look at every industry. Sports, business people, farming, everything. They're long-term thinking people and they do the little shit long-term. And they don't let the setback sway them. You know, they stay the course.

Yeah. Like, we probably had some bad years in there, that 10-year period of applying BioCal, but you stuck to it. Yeah. You stuck to it. And we're sitting here today, and we had a damn good year.

Damn good year. Corn on corn. Great. Best corn on corn I've ever raised. Best corn on corn ever raised. And if you want to see some more about that, we just dropped a harvest video or dropping harvest videos on our other channel. This will do farm. And you can check it out.

Yeah. When we're all done, when we get the yield maps done, we should do one where we do the yield maps and we do the soil maps. Yeah. Because I'm not one of these guys. You know, some of these people, it's like, you know, how their stuff does, it's like this, I don't know, it's like it's intelligence and her, it's top secret and I don't know. Maybe I should be more that way, but I don't really care.

All in all, I'll tell you this, I'm, I'm very happy with, with BioCal. I'm probably going to keep using it until I find a reason to do something different. And I've had great results with it. And I'm not a paid, I'm not a paid spokesman. They don't, they don't sponsor the podcast. although if they'd like to, I'd like to talk to you. All right. So what is your biggest goal within your operation?

Oh, so I kind of want to touch on two parts of this. We'll talk about the operation and then we'll kind of talk about the brand, kind of what we're doing as far as social media goes. So I'll start with the operation. You guys kind of already know, we talked about this and the question that dad asked me previous to this one. we want to buy farm ground we want to get farm ground we either want to buy hog barns build hog barns get more ground um those are kind of the those are kind of the two things either get more hog barns

so we can cash flow more or go out and buy some some more grounds so we can farm some more acres either way we're trying to put as much back into the operation to grow this thing and we're not going to be short-term thinking as far as buying the nice fancy shit, although I know it would look great on YouTube and it would probably be really nice to, you know, to run that, you know, I'm, I want to do it. I want to do it. And I know you guys would love to see it. But, you know, we just, we're going to play the long game. We're going to play the long game and we're going to have our assets first. We're going to get our assets first. And then we can buy the nice stuff second. So you agree with that? I agree with that. Yeah.

Okay, and then as far as the biggest goal, as far as the brand wise goes, we just want to keep bringing just valuable content to you guys on both channels, Barn Talk, the podcast, TDF. We want to just keep dropping amazing content for you guys that you guys like and find entertaining and get value from. And the other thing is I want to find a way to, you know what I'm going to say. I would like to sell our meat direct to consumer somehow. I know that is a big, big, big, big, big challenge, but it is a dream of mine.

I'm not going to lie. I have thought about it and our followers and subscribers have asked me about it. And I couldn't, I could, I would be lying if I told you that hasn't, that thought has not gone through my mind. And I know, you know, we contract grow pigs and there's so many variables and can you find a USDA facility? trust me. I know all the variables and all the challenges with that, but I think it would be so cool that we could show you how we farm and walk, you know, you guys pretty much go around with us on this farm

and we're hog farmers and you see the why, you see the family values on our farm, you see the how, you know, you see them when they're wiener pigs, you see them when we load them out, and then we could be able to provide, deliver a product to your door, from the farm that you watch, you know, I think that'd be so cool. I think that'd be so cool. And I think it would help our operation out as far as just financially, obviously, it would if it could pencil. And it would be a really cool tie-in to everything that we're doing.

So that's kind of my biggest goal as far as media-wise. Obviously, the content comes first and providing value guys comes first. But I would be lying if that wasn't on my mind. And that's been a really, you know, that's been kind of a secret I've been keeping. You know, I haven't really told a lot of people about that, but I'm telling you guys. But I'm not going to lie. It's a thought that I have going through my head. I just want, I just want my picture on the back of every pack of Daly's bacon.

And if, if Triumph Foods would like, I don't know, I'd be, I'm cheap, you know, like just give me, say, a penny a slice. A penny a slice. Yeah. To have Tork's picture. I even put on bibs in a. and a pitchfork, you know, it would be like, that'd be cool too. This bacon came from torque. That'd be cool too.

And, you know, the other thing with that too is it really does with that goal and that dream, it would really bridge the gap. It bridge the gap between the consumer and the farmer. Because everything that we're doing for our brand,

there's a ton of farmers out there doing the same thing we are, is to bridge that gap. Our mission is to bridge the gap between farmers and consumers and show people where their food comes from and kind of... Well, restore the faith that... And your fellow farmer and shit...

Because there's so many... Unfortunately, there's a lot of organizations out there that paint farmers in a bad light and say we're all corporate owned and say that we don't care. We don't give a shit about what goes into the food or what goes into the animal and we don't give a shit about what goes on to our fields.

We're poison in the water. And we don't care about runoff or anything like that when we do care because this, everything we're doing is going to go to our, the next generation. You're one of these people that they paint you to be, you won't be raising pig. Right. You won't be feeding cattle. You couldn't do it. You won't be raising chicken.

Bridge the gap. That's the biggest part. That's the cool part about it. Uh, dad, last question. Do you have a farm transition plan? And if so, what does that conversation look like? Yeah, so I'm in the middle of a transition plan from the last generation to me. So my father passed away here a few years ago.

My mother is in a retirement home. The land that we farm is actually in a trust for her care. And at some point, that will transfer to the next generation. and I have two brothers that aren't involved in the farm, but obviously, you know, that was all set up, and we all get along and it'll all transfer when that happens. I have two sons. Sawyer I farm with and Clay, my other son, he is in real.

estate with Sawyer and does a bunch of other stuff. He's got his own business. And he's got his own business. And Sawyer and Clay have a great relationship. And they both know the value of this farming operation and the value of keeping something like this together. Because, you know, a farm is a tough, tough thing because there's a farm that's going to be sold just about a mile from us.

240 acres is going to be sold in a week. And that is a, that's the third generation that's selling it. And there's three kids, I think, and it's going to bring huge money. It's going to bring, my guess is it's going to bring between $15,000 and $17,000 an acre. And, you know, $4 million. And, oh, yeah, $4 million. That's great. that money will be gone and a generation.

Yep. In one generation, that money will be gone because the government is going to tax a living shit out of it. It's going to be divided three ways. Depending on how they invest it, how they spend it, they're going to pay a bunch of tax, they're going to pay a bunch of capital gains, and then it's going to have all that money

and all whatever they buy with it is going to get transferred to another generation, which will have to pay capital gains and inheritance tax, and within another generation, gone. If it even gets to that. If it even gets there. So, to me, that's really, really sad. You know, and everybody's different.

You know, to them, they don't have a connection to it. And I'm not judging them because if I didn't have a connection to what I'm doing, I wouldn't be as passionate about it. But I kind of feel like the older I get, the more focused I probably, am on trying to make sure that this can stay together. And you know what? Sawyer and Clay are going to have to, they're going to have to figure that out too because then it gets, it gets more interesting when you go another generation because I don't know how many kids are going to be involved in that. But, you know, we have the conversation all the time. And so the plan is, basically, I want to die

broke because when I get to the point where I don't I can't do what I do every day and don't want to do it I'm going to need them to do it and if they're the ones that are doing it they should get the benefit and I don't know what that looks like what you know we've talked about doing a corp we're all involved in stuff together and so we have we have different LLCs and different corps the farm is not in a corporation and I don't know whether we'll do that it used to be that everybody did trust and then we kind of went away from that

and we did corpse the problem with a corp is it's really hard if you ever decide that you want to disband it and I feel like more people are doing trust today I don't know how we'll do it I do know this I'm just about to the point

where I probably am not okay when I sell my business I want the best tax and investment advice. I want to help my kids, and I want to give back to the community. Ooh, then it's the vacation of a lifetime. I wonder if my head of office has a forever setting. An IG Private Wealth Advisor creates the clarity you need with plans that harmonize your business,

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19 plus Ontario only. Please play responsibly. Concern about your gambling or that of someone close to you. Call 16-531-2600 or visit Connexontera.ca. my wife and I probably are to the point where we are about done accumulating assets because it makes no sense for us to buy more stuff to have to worry about somehow transferring it to the next generation. So our goal is to help, well, just do what we're doing. And these two boys that we've got, they can. They can do it.

I don't have any doubt that they can do it. So we're just encouraging them that they should be the ones to acquire the assets and pay for the assets. And, you know, if I'm lucky, they won't turn on me. And, you know, I won't. Somebody will wipe my butt someday when I need it. Although I hope it's not Sawyer because he's, he's, he's not a very tender nurse, I don't think. Yeah. So I don't know how well that answer your question, but that's, you know, that's the

We'll touch on this. I mean, like dad said, we all have an understanding that this is just, it's more than just one generation. Clay and I are very, dad, Clay, and I, my mom, we're all legacy-oriented. We understand that we want to leave a legacy. We want to do that, we want to make this farm viable and then do it better than the previous generations before us. and like dad said clay and i are we're they're encouraging us and they've always encouraged us to you know go and purchase assets and you know do it and just go do it and do it smart be smart about it but now with the farming you know dad's kind of like you know if we're going to go do

something you might as well just go and get it because you know you're going to be the next generation and why would i you go for it good you can do it and so So that's cool. And Clay and I understand that. And Clay and I know what's been here, all the work that generations have done and, you know, all the work they put into it. And we've known how much our dad has sacrificed to keep this farm going.

So we know that we just know that we'll never, whatever happens, we're going to keep this thing going. Like no matter what, we're going to keep this thing going. and we're in agreeance on that. And yeah, we don't have all the technical details worked out yet as far as that goes. And we don't really know what that looks like. But we do know we're going to make it work.

We're going to make it work no matter what. And we're going to put our feelings aside if. And, you know, the other thing is my, I tell my brother all the time, I'm not here to. There's a lot of siblings out there that, unfortunately, you know, they fuck their they fuck their siblings over pretty much. Unfortunately, they really do. And I've always told Clay that, you know, I know I'm the one farming, but I'm not here to, you know, fuck, you know, fuck you got anything because, you know, you're, you're just as important to this operation than I am, you know, you, you're doing something off the farm, but it's also for our kids benefit. You know, I couldn't

be invested in real estate without my brother. So, you know, he's doing a big part off, I guess off the scene or whatever off the farm, but it's still a massive part into the next generation. So I, we, we, we don't know what, like I said, we don't know all the technical details of how to transition that, but I do know that it's going to get transitioned intact and it's going to stay intact no matter what. So, yeah, I don't know.

I don't know. We, I don't know if we reanswered that the best. But you got to just make sure everybody's, good. If you're going to, if you're going to transition a farm and you really want to keep the farm, you got to make sure you've got to have conversations. Communication is the thing. Yeah. I mean, don't, don't wait to write your will and don't wait to discuss your will among your family members until you fucking croak over and die. I mean, you got to have that conversation probably many times before you get to that point. I mean,

you got to have those conversations and have everybody sit down and say, you know, I don't care if you sell this farm or I don't want you to sell this freaking farm no matter what. I mean simple as that. Okay, we're running out of time so we better get on the high horse. Here's your last

question. Okay. How many barns would you run if money wasn't a factor when it came to building them? Oh man. We know guys that there's guys that are kind of loving legends around here and hopefully we can get some of them on the podcast. But I mean there's guys out here that have in South

southeast Iowa to have 75 barns 75 ae mean they got they got a shitload of barns and we talked i think though the question was how many would you run oh how many would i may well i mean come on how many would i run do all the labor that we're doing right now no more than what we have right now i'll do i'll do two i'll do i'll do two sides of it so if i'm going to do all the chores dad and i are going to do the chores boy let me tell you of four hog barns is a lot even between two people if you're doing a wing to finish it's a lot i mean it just is you got to move you're moving pigs sorting pigs getting pigs somewhere loading out pigs somewhere sorting and sorting sort and you mean loading pigs treating pigs you know it's it's every day and it's

something there's just there's always something there's always a place that you're getting pigs always a place you're sending out pigs sending out overstocks sending out fat hogs getting pigs at another I mean, there's always something to do even when you don't want to do it. Right. And it's the truth. I mean, it might be a little different if it was a feeder pig because you don't have to do any of that weaner pig stuff. You don't have to pick pigs up and treat them.

You don't have to mess with the mats. You don't have to mess with the other ones. But you're loading out a third more pigs. Yep. And that's the other thing. You got to load more pigs, which, uh, man, I'd rather mess with the weiner pigs. I would, so I would stay at four. If we're, if I'm doing all the labor, I'd stay at four.

And that's with my dad's help. So if you're doing wean to finish, if you don't mind loading, you could probably do more. But just know, loading can get really old and it can wear on your body. But if I had all the money, money wasn't a factor and I could go buy bards and I would do it like the people that live around here that... Triple net lease them. I would triple net lease the shit out of them. Or I would fire a couple good guys to do it and I'd manage the guys. and I mean I you know hell I don't know how many barns I'd buy as many as I could get my hands on I guess yeah I mean yeah well it's like anything so for us so for us I feel like hog buildings are like people that buy rental property so if if I found a barn that I thought was worth the money I'd buy it because I can make that cash flow I can't make $17,000 an acre ground cash flow but if I can buy a hog barn for

a $220 a pig space used, I'll buy it because I can make it work because I know what it takes. I know what has to be done. I know what has to be fixed. I know that. So that's the thing about it is, and they will cash flow if you, and it's just like a rental property.

If you know, if you buy it right, if you know what you can pay and what it's going to cost you, what has to be done, there's a lot you do. And the other thing is, Not everybody can do that. Right. You got specific knowledge.

We got specific knowledge. That's the good thing about knowing an industry and knowing it well is because you know what's good and what's not. But yeah, I mean, hell, if I could buy as many as I could, I would just, I mean, it's just, it's no different than buying a rental property. It really isn't. There are more factors I'd probably say than a rental property because they're, you know, all the things that we've gone over in this episode, manure or maintenance, person that's not doing the job. ASF. Yeah, yeah. We didn't even talk about that.

Yeah, there's a ton of factors, but yeah, money was no object. I'd buy a lot. Okay, we're going to wind this down because we... Yeah, we're going to wind this down. I don't know, what are we, what are we at? 1.30? Do you think we have time for... Nope. No, we don't have...

I think we're close on one of the cameras. Okay, well, yeah, see, these are the... This is the... The downside of not getting all of your footage off of the car. Well, this is the downside of not having somebody behind the scenes running the cameras. We're a two-man show here. So bear with us on some stuff. We might mess up on some technical difficulties, but we're trying our best here, being on the show and keeping all the equipment going. So we're going to wrap it up.

Hope you guys got a lot of value out of these questions. Keep asking them. Keep sending us your questions. Thank you so much for listening. We've been growing a lot. If you guys want to follow along on the clips, we're posting TikTok clips. Our TikTok can Daniels Barn Talk and you can get short snippets of the show. That seems to be really growing to getting a lot of support on TikTok that's coming over to YouTube. But every one of you guys matters, every one of you guys that listens or watches the show, we really appreciate you guys a lot. So keep sharing the show and keep sending us to your questions. Thanks for listening, watching. And if I can get my stuff done, we'll see you back. We'll see

you back for the next one. Yep. Have a great weekend.