As a generation of plains farmers reaches its later years, families across the state wrestle with the hardest harvest of all — handing the farm to the next hands, or letting it go.
The average age of the plains farmer climbs with each census, and behind that dry statistic lies one of the most fraught questions a farm family can face: what becomes of the land when the founding generation can no longer work it. Succession, the lawyers call it, but around the kitchen table it is simply the future, and it is rarely simple.
The Hardest Crop to Bring In
A farm that has grown large enough to support one family may not stretch to two, and the child who stayed to work the land and the children who left for the city all carry a claim, real or felt. Rising land values, once a blessing, complicate the arithmetic of a fair division. The wise families begin the conversation years before it is forced upon them.
From the almanac's reckoning:
- The average age of North Dakota farmers rises with each agricultural census.
- Rising land values complicate an equitable division among heirs.
- Successful transfers typically begin planning years in advance.
Where the transfer succeeds, a young family takes up the work with the elders' counsel still close at hand, and the farm passes intact into another generation. The almanac holds that no yield map or grain contract matters half so much as this, the handing-on of the ground itself.
Elsewhere in the Almanac
Reading the Sky: Drought, Irrigation and the Missouri's Water
In a state where most crops drink only what the clouds provide, the recurring specter of drought keeps every grower's eye on the rain gauge — and turns some toward the water of the Missouri.
Flax Returns: The Blue-Flowered Crop Finds New Favor
Prized for its oil and its omega-rich seed, flax has staged a quiet comeback across the plains, its brief blue bloom once again dotting the northern fields.
The Country Elevator: Still the Heart of the Grain Town
Beside the rail line in a hundred plains towns, the grain elevator stands as it has for a century — weighing the harvest, holding it, and shipping it to the wider world.