SVM Ag Magazine - Summer 2023

P A R T Y

A herd of Deere, a litter of Cubs, a team of Wheelhorses ... Folks found ’em all, and more, at AJ’s Garden Tractor Jamboree

A budding young farmer has quite a dandy spread. Couple welcomes a rare goat into their Happy Little home. Any way you slice it, melons can teach kids a lot about farming. Sauk Valley residents capture picture-perfect moments on the farm.

25 PAGE

Magazine editor & Page design Rusty Schrader For Advertising

Contact Jill Reyna at 815-631-8774 or jreyna@saukvalley.com

4

A budding young farmer

With only three candles on his birthday cake, Buddy Murray had already decided what he wanted for his next birthday: To be a farmer.

A rare breed indeed

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Garden party

A herd of Deere, a litter of Cubs, a team of Wheelhorses ... folks could find them all, and more, at AJ’s Garden Tractor Jamboree.

A goat considered critically close to extinction has made its way to the Sauk Valley, thanks to a couple who’s welcomed them into their Happy Little home. 18

They heard it through the melon vine

Students learn about agriculture, thanks to a farm family who knows that any way you slice it, melons can teach kids a lot.

Farm focus

Sauk Valley residents capture picture-perfect moments on the farm.

Budding farmeryoung A

Now in his first year in the double-digit age bracket, Buddy’s living his dream on the two-and-a-half acre spread he’s growing up on in rural Oregon. Buddy, 10, with the help of his mother, Andrea Murray, is growing flowers, fruits and vegetables and raising a flock of chickens at Dandelion Feathers Farm. He spends much of his day tending to his few rows of plants — making sure they’re healthy and free of invasives — caring for his animals, and rounding up the colorful eggs his chickens lay.

Buddy’s plot is just the right size for him to dig in and learn more about the career he staked out at a young age — and it’s also like a birthday gift that keeps on giving.

Buddy said he “kind of” remembers the time he first told his mother that he wanted to be a farmer. They lived in rural Pontiac at the time, and “I remember sitting at the table when I said that. [Then] I wished for it every birthday.”

He and his mom moved to the Oregon area three years ago, and with a new home came new opportunities.

One night at the dinner table, then-3-year-old Buddy Murray made an important announcement: He wanted to be a farmer when he grew up.

With yard space to spare, Andrea helped make Buddy’s birthday wish come true. She suggested he use some of the land to try his hand at growing a few things.

“We just kind of let it all happen and rolled with it,” Andrea said. “Buddy said he wanted to be a farmer, so we got the chickens, and he was growing peppers and tomatoes. Then he said he wanted pumpkins. That just wasn’t enough. We had no idea this would be where we are this year. I think God really presents stuff to us.”

With every plant that popped up and every egg that popped out, Buddy learned more and more about farming. Learning to coax crops from the land takes patience and time, and a bit of trial and error — just ask any full-grown farmer — but Buddy’s off to a good start.

Buddy has also built up a collection of books on agriculture, animal science and horticulture — some written with someone older than 10 in mind, but that doesn’t keep Buddy from perusing the pages — both early in the morning and late at night, all to make his operation a success.

Buddy Murray and his mother Andrea operate Dandelion Feathers Farm west of Oregon. They moved to the area three years ago and Buddy has set out on a dream he had since he was 3 years old: To be a farmer.

Every morning after breakfast, Buddy heads outside where the first thing he does is feed his chickens, and when they hear his familiar call — “Ba-gock! Ba-gock, ba-gock! — they come a-runnin’ from the coop. He also helps tend to a couple of goats and a rescue horse, all with the same TLC he gives the flock of chickens.

About 20 chickens call the coop their home, and one of them has become Buddy’s favorite, Fluffy, named so “because she’s fluffy,” he said. Other members of the feathered flock were given fitting names, too: There’s Sundae, who looks like a chocolate sundae, Buddy said; Guin, who looked like a penguin when she was a chick; the all-white Angel, and Hazel and Cocoa, named after their colors.

Buddy has gotten to know his flock well, and already he’s learned to spot when there’s something a bit off with the pecking order

“All of the chickens have a different personality,” Buddy said, “and if it changes, you know that there’s something wrong.”

Buddy and his mom also grow flowers at Dandelion Farms. The flowers have been sold in bouquets arranged at the farm, but Andrea also plans to have a bouquet bar at the store, where customers can arrange their own bouquets. It can be fun, Andrea said, “not just grabbing flowers, but make it an experience to share together.”

His feathered friends even inspired the Dandelion Feathers name. When he was younger, Buddy would say that the yellow chicks looked like dandelions, an observation his mom picked up on, too.

“The first chicks we hatched out, when they got a bit older and they molt their feathers, the feathers went all over,” Buddy said. “[Mom] said, ‘It’s kind of like dandelions.’”

Once he’s done tending to the animals, it’s time for Buddy to hop over the fence and work on the plants. Along with the tomatoes and peppers, the early summer crop also includes asparagus, strawberries, spiraling Egyptian walking onions, poppies, gladiolus and sunflowers, among others. Andrea and Buddy plan to grow more sunflowers next year than the three beds that are there now, and have it be his big crop.

Pumpkins and squash are grown in the fall, and this year Buddy will make sure to keep an extra close eye on them. Early in the season last year, he saw his crop look a little funny and hit his books to find out about what was going on. Buddy found out about squash bugs and vine borers.

“We had to cut open the vine and get out the borers and had to get rid of them because they hollowed out the vine, and eventually got to the pumpkin and hollowed out the pumpkin,” Buddy said.

Buddy decided to add pumpkins to the farm while working outside one day and recalling a visit to a pumpkin farm. “Some people were nice enough to let him buy some, and he would sit outside in front of the house with them,” Andrea said. “Then we started growing them.”

As Buddy has come to learn, there’s a lot more to farming than just planting and growing. There’s weather to take into consideration, the makeup of the land around the garden, and helping keep crops healthy. They removed some black walnut trees, which contain a chemical toxin called juglone that severely hinders the growth of crops. Buddy also learned which bugs are good for plants and which are bad, like learning the roles of ants versus aphids.

Buddy also learned the impact pesticides can have on produce, when he tasted the difference between store-bought strawberries and the ones he grew, he said.

Much of what he grows, as well as the organic eggs from his chickens, is sold inside a small store on the property, open Thursday through Saturday afternoons. The store also includes some of Andrea’s interests, such as women’s boutique clothing, organic animal care products and feed, and religious gifts.

Overlooking nothing. Ready for everything.

Farmers and ranchers, the world relies on you. And you deserve a bank that’s rooted in the details and dedicated to helping you do more.

Contact: dandelionfeathersfarm@ gmail.com, or 309-242-7086.

Online: Find “Dandelion feathers farm” on Facebook or go to dandelionfeathers.com

Andrea is also developing a bouquet bar with some of the flowers that Buddy grows, where customers can choose how they want their arrangements to look.

“Hopefully people will want to come pick flowers and make their own bouquets,” she said. “Doing your own bouquet can mean more [as a gift]. You can come with your children, make the bouquet and take it home with you. It can last long because it’s nice and fresh, and it can be a fun experience — not just grabbing flowers, but make it an experience to share together.”

When it comes to buying seeds and feed, Andrea coordinated it early on, but as Buddy gets older, she’s beginning to pass some of that knowledge on to him. He’s currently learning about a ledger, how much things cost and how much he can spend on growing more crops based on what he earns from selling.

Along with all that he’s learned from the land, Buddy also gets the rest of his education at home — and he’s not the first to learn from there. Andrea homeschools Buddy from their nearby home, which once was the Pleasant Valley rural country school, District 89, until 1947.

Early on, Buddy tended to take disappointments

and setbacks harder, but the more he grows up the more he grows, and he’s learning to be more patient, think things through, and learn from anything that goes wrong. Having a place at home to work that all out, especially at his age, should help Buddy have “a pretty good head on his shoulders,” Andrea said.

“He’s handled it much better now,” she said. “Initially, it was just like with anyone: We all learn how to handle stuff, and disappointment is hard for children. It’s definitely been something that’s helped him to learn how to be patient with issues, and how to deal with it instead of just letting it take over.

“If we can start here like we are, in 10 years, he’ll be so much further ahead then, if this is really what he wants. He will have had so much knowledge than he would have had if he said he wanted to do it when he was 20.”

For now, Buddy’s enjoying his time doing what he’s wanted to do since he was 3 — and how many people can say they’re doing what they’ve wanted to do since that age? It’s something he loves doing, and there’s nothing he doesn’t enjoy.

“There’s nothing really specific, I just like everything,” he said. “Everything’s my favorite. Everything’s fun.”

Cody Cutter can be reached at 815-632-2532 or ccutter@shawmedia.com.

Happy Little Hooves is a farm near Sterling that’s home to dozens of goats, including six of this rare breed: the Arapawa. “They’re beautiful,” said Abby Sweeney, who owns the farm with her husband, Shawn. ALEX T. PASCHAL/ APASCHAL@SHAWMEDIA.COM

here are only about 500 or 600 Arapawa goats in the world, and only about half of them are in the U.S., so if you were trying to track one down, you’d be hard-pressed to do it — unless you were looking in The Sauk Valley.

A half-dozen of the hoofers have joined the farm family at Happy Little Hooves Farm outside of Sterling, where the couple who run the operation are doing their part to get the goat off the Livestock Conservancy’s critically endangered list. Happy Little Hooves is a three-acre spread that’s home to nearly 40 goats from three registered breeds “who are like our children,” said Abby Sweeney, who’s owned the farm with her husband, Shawn, for nearly 5 years. The latest addition to the fold are the Arapawas, and that makes the Sweeneys the only breeder of the goat in Illinois.

GOAT cont’d to page 14

GOATS cont’d from page 13

“They’re beautiful,” Abby said about the newest additions to their farm. “They’re very inquisitive. Arapawa is a semi-feral breed, so they need a lot of human interaction.”

The Arapawas arrived at the Sweeneys’ farm in May, where they were in quarantine for 30 days for health reasons and to get them acclimated to their new home.

Arapawa are medium-sized, predominately black, brown and white goats. Does (adult females) weigh between 60 and 80 pounds and bucks (adult males) weigh up to 125 pounds. They’re not aggressive goats, and they become attached to their goat family and human keepers.

So how did the Sweeneys get their goats?

Abby said her husband, “a king researcher,” came across information about the Arapawa being the rarest goat in the world, which was news to the couple, and they decided to add them to their growing farm family. They contacted the Arapawa Goat Breeders Association, which helped them find breeders they liked in Indiana and Connecticut.

GOATS cont’d to page 15

GOATS cont’d from page 14

They eventually lined up six. Two of them came from the Still Waters Farm in Danville, Indiana. Legacy and Evolution are males (bucklings). Legacy has straight ears. Evolution has floppy ears.

The other four are from the Newbury Farms in Newton, Connecticut. There’s 7-year-old Magnolia; Lucy, who’s about a year and half and is Magnolia’s daughter and Finn’s half-sister; Buster, a castrated male (a wether) that’s about a year old and is Lucy’s son; and Finn, a buck that’s about 6 months old and is Magnolia’s son. The boys in the herd have floppy ears and the girls have a straight right ear and a floppy left ear. Magnolia has longer hair than the other Arapawa goats on the farm.

GOATS cont’d to page 16

Abby and Shawn tend to some of their Arapawa goats. The couple hopes to be able to breed and donate the goats to zoos. “[We want] to be able to make a difference in a critically endangered breed,” Abby said.

FAMILY ... The Sweeneys’ farm is home to nearly 40 goats from three registered breeds, including the hirsute little hoofers seen here: a mini silky fainter (at right, held by Abby), and the mini-LaManchas (at left, being fed by Shawn). The LaMancha is a mid-size goat well suited to dairy production, and according to the Miniature Dairy Goat Association, is the only goat breed that was developed in America. Shawn milks four goats on the farm, using the product for soap, ice cream, drinking, and supplementing feed for other animals on the farm. The mini silky fainter is a favorite among those who raise show goats, owing to its long and lustrous locks, but its propensity for fainting also attracts a lot of attention. The goats don’t actually faint, but rather seize up and often tumble over when startled, due to a genetic condition known as myotonia congenita.

There’s another difference in the herd. “We were told by the Connecticut breeder that Arapawa goats on the East Coast seem to be darker than the ones found in the Midwest,” Abby said. “What we have seems to verify this. It’s most likely because of genetics and the lines they come from.”

The Arapawa breed is named for the Arapawa Island near New Zealand, which was the goats’ home for centuries. They thrived there until the 1970s, when the New Zealand Forest Service decided the goats were damaging the native forest and the herd had to be culled.

Arapawa Island residents Betty and Walt Rowe, along with friends and volunteers, created a sanctuary for the breed in 1987. They began with 40 goats in domestication.

The Rowes received international attention for their work, which is the reason why the Arapawa goat survives today, according to the Livestock Conservancy, a not-for-profit organization that focuses on preserving and promoting rare breeds of livestock.

The Sweeneys love all their goats, whose diet is mainly roughage (grass or hay), grain, fruit and the occasional serving of Cheerios or potato chips.

In addition to the Arapawa, the Sweeneys have two other registered breeds: Mini Lamancha goats and Mini Silky Fainting goats, which are known to “faint” when startled but recover quickly when their muscles relax after contracting involuntarily (a characteristic caused by a genetic mutation).

The Sweeneys also have two special needs goats.

Two-year-old Reba is a permanent house goat, “unless at some time we feel it’s safe for her to be outside,” Sweeney said. “She’s a very high degree fainter, bottom of the totem pole outside. She does go outside to visit the other girls, but she lets us know when it’s time to go inside. She’s incredibly smart. She’s even potty trained herself.”

Bunny, who is 14 weeks old, is the other special needs goat.

“She’s a temporary house guest while she heals (she had her back left leg amputated because of a compound fracture). We’re working on transitioning her, but it will take time,” Sweeney said.

Also at the Happy Little Hooves farm are pigs, chickens, two mini fillies (Triscuit and Biscuit) and two guardian dogs that live with the female goats in the main barn.

The dogs are Great Pyrenees. Koona (“squirrel” in Hopi) is a 2 1/2-year-old female and Tatanka (“buffalo” in Lakota) is a year-old male.

“Goats are just like cats and dogs. They have different personalities,” Abby said. “They can be brats, skittish, and mean to others, and there’s a definite hierarchy.

But “for us,” she said, “they’re cathartic and therapeutic.” n

Tours of Happy Little Hooves are offered from 1-3 p.m. and 3-5 p.m. Friday through Sunday, and 10 a.m. to noon Saturday and Sunday. The tours are free, but donations are welcome, with money going toward the goats’ care and feeding. Call 309-206-7579 for more information.

Go to happylittlehoovesfarm.com or find Happy Little Hooves on Facebook to learn more about Arapawa goats, go to the Arapawa Goat Breeders Association arapawagoatsusa.org.

Magnolia is one of six Arapawa goats on the Sweeneys’ farm, two of which are her offspring.

oug and Jeanne Mitchell have helped teach local students quite a bit through the years: How nature works. The different parts of our ecosystem. The important role that agriculture plays. They’ve even taught kids their A, Bee, C’s. And they’ve done it all with melons.

Doug and Jeanne are two of the Mitchells who make up Mitchell Melons, a family farm operation in Tampico with decades of history in its fields.

The second-generation owners are also big proponents of the Ag in the Classroom program, which brings farming out of the fields and into schools. For the past few years, they’ve volunteered their time to share their knowledge with gradeschoolers in Whiteside County, earning the appreciation of educators who recognize the importance what these experts in their field bring to the classroom.

In December, they also earned the thanks of the Illinois Farm Bureau.

The Mitchell family was awarded a prestigious honor from the Farm Bureau during its annual conference in December in Chicago, as an Ag in the Classroom Volunteer of the Year award winner.

Doug and Jeanne are the oldest of three generations on the family farm, which also includes Doug and Jeanne’s daughter, Whitney Mitchell-DeWitte, and her husband, Brandon DeWitte. Jeanne and Whitney have done much of the classroom work in recent years, showing them how to grow a melon and providing video and Power Point tours of their farm and operation, located a couple of miles northeast of Tampico.

MITCHELL cont’d to page 20

Mitchell Melons has been growing melons east of Tampico for nearly 60 years. Its management team includes (from left) owners Jeanne and Doug Mitchell; Whitney Mitchell-DeWitte, holding her daughter, Laiken; Brandon DeWitte, holding son Logan; and longtime employee Mike Kelly.

The Mitchells were nominated for the award by Matt Lillipop, the Whiteside County Farm Bureau’s Executive Director, and its Ag in the Classroom Coordinator Diane Baker. They invited the Mitchells to come to the conference, but the award came as a surprise to them.

“It was completely off the radar, we had no idea,” Doug said. “We were invited to come up, and we still had no idea how big it was.”

“It was quite the honor,” Jeanne said.

The Mitchells work with Baker to schedule visits to classrooms, and this year they made it to second-grade classrooms at Tampico Elementary, Prophetstown Elementary, St. Mary School in Sterling and East Coloma-Nelson School in Rock Falls. Lillipop and Baker, who make the rounds to county schools for additional ag lessons, think highly of the Mitchells.

“Matt Lillipop and Diane Baker are so great to work with,” Jeanne said. “People need this. The kids need to learn. Ag in the Classroom is a phenomenal thing for the kids.

With each visit, Jeanne and Whitney bring Dixie cups, small pots, seeds, and heaps of soil to give kids a hands-on demonstration of how a tiny seed can sprout into such a large fruit. From there, students take their seed and soil home where they can transplant it and watch it grow. Some students have shared their results with the Mitchells, who have recognized their successes on its Facebook page.

“We’ll encourage them and give them information about what to do with them when they get them home, and what to look for,” Jeanne said. “We have had a couple who have grow them all the way into maturity, to where they can cut them and eat them.”

There’s also question-and-answer time where students can pose questions.

One of the facts that creates a bit of a buzz with the kids is the key role that bumblebees play in the melon growing process. The students are fascinated to learn how these industrious insects pollinate the plants, playing a vital role in the process that turns seeds into melons, and pollination into profit.

Some of the bees on the Mitchell farm are brought in to do their work, but others come naturally, from the nearby Hennepin Feeder Canal, which is a haven for busy little buzzers in the early summer. Doug said that bumblebees, as opposed to honey bees, work harder, longer and in tougher conditions.

Helping kids grow ...

Left: Whitney Mitchell-DeWitte of Mitchell Melons shows students in Rebecca Repass’ second-grade class at East Coloma-Nelson School in Rock Falls how to plant melon seeds.

Below: The Mitchells were honored by the Illinois Farm Bureau during its annual conference December in Chicago as an Ag in the Classroom Volunteer of the Year award winner. From left: owners Doug and Jeanne Mitchell, Whiteside County Farm Bureau Ag in the Classroom coordinator Diane Baker, Whitney MitchellDeWitte and Brandon DeWitte. SUBMITTED PHOTOS

Melons and tractors run in the family

Left: Doug and Jeanne Mitchell plant melon seeds on their Tampico farm. Doug is a second-generation grower whose children and grandchildren have become involved in Mitchell Melons in recent years, including the little fourth-generation helpers. Above: Logan (on the cart) and Laiken DeWitte (on the tractor).

SUBMITTED PHOTOS

“The bees always fascinate the kids,” Doug said. “You can’t get a melon without a bee, it has to be pollinated. The kids know about the bees and are taught how important they are, but until they see that they have to go from one flower to another flower — that gives them a sense of actually how important it is.”

For about 85 to 90 days starting in mid-May, the Mitchells grow both regular and seedless watermelons; the seedless ones have become popular sellers in recent years, Doug said. Sensation melons also are popular; they’re round like a seedless watermelon, soft in texture and sweet in flavor. “It’s phenomenal,” Doug said. “Anyone who eats it will want it again. They go nuts over it.” They also grew yellow watermelons last year (yellow inside, the usual green on the outside), and Whitney started growing and selling pumpkins last year.

Mitchell Melons are found in most grocery stores within a 60-mile radius from Tampico, with the Savanna-based Sullivan’s Foods — with stores throughout northern Illinois — their largest customer.

The family also has a stand at their farm that operates from late July to mid-to-late September, where the current three generations of Mitchells — Doug and Jeanne, Whitney and Brandon, and Logan and Laiken DeWitte — can be found selling melons, greeting returning customers and making friends with new ones. They like to have the stand operating in time for National Watermelon Day, on Aug. 3. In addition, other workers, some having been with the farm for more than 30 years and others still in high school, are an important part of the operation.

Like the family that runs it, generations of customers are part of the farm’s story. It’s not unusual to see customers return to the stand each year for decades, eventually bringing their own children. It’s become as much of a ritual of summer as sinking your teeth into a juicy melon and spitting out the seeds.

“We’ve had people come down here for more than 50 years,” Doug said. “You can build a relationship, and that’s pretty special. It’s unique in that there’s not too many people who do it. We take great pride in the quality of our melons.”

“It’s fun to see people, both workers and customers, who came here as kids and then come back,” Jeanne added. “Even if they live away from here, they’ve always found it fun to come back.”

Doug’s parents, Wayne and Jean Mitchell, began farming melons from their home in Manito, about 20 miles south of Peoria in Mason County. After finding the soil there wasn’t as suitable for melon farming as they had hoped, and with irrigation not an option at the time, they headed north, to Tampico, to find better ground. The Mitchells put down roots at their current farm in 1966, and since then the family farm has become a favorite destination for the melons the family has perfected during their nearly 60 years in business.

This season will be the first for Doug without either parent helping out in the operation. Wayne died in 2014 and Jean, who still helped out at the farm stand up until last year, passed away in February.

For more than 40 years, the Ag in the Classroom program has been teaching students nationwide, from all walks of life, about the journey from farm to plate, as well as encouraging future generations to play a role in that journey. Whether it’s the food we eat, the medicine we take, or a host of other everyday products, knowing how these things are created and the role farming plays gives children a better understanding of just how important agriculture is to their everyday lives.

The Mitchells are promoting ag education not just through their melons, but through the seeds they plant in the generations of future farmers.

“They’re interested to learn,” Jeanne said, “and they want to know where their food is coming from.” n

Cody Cutter can be reached at 815-632-2532 or ccutter@shawmedia.com.

The melon stand at Mitchell Melons, 5549 Luther Road, east of Tampico, opens in late July and runs through early-to-mid September. Find “Mitchell Melons Tampico, IL” on Facebook for up-to-date information on operating dates and hours, and to find out what local stores carry its melons. Also find it @mitchellmelons on Instagram, email mitchellmelons@ gmail.com or call 815-535-8901 for more information.

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he garden tractors in Andy Hinrichs’ fleet have been the miniature workhorses on his rural homestead for years, and like other garden tractors, there’s not much you can’t do with them — and that includes giving a father and son some priceless memories and helping start an annual event that attracts hundreds of people each year.

Andy has long had an appreciation for these powerful pint-sized trac-

tors, and he passed it down to his son, AJ, who enjoyed the thrill of putting his hands at “10 and 2” on a tractor that was just the right size for him when he was a young boy. Since then, AJ has grown into a young man, and the local event that bears his name has grown into an event that brings people from throughout the Midwest to the family’s rural Oregon home: AJ’s Garden Tractor Jamboree.

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A herd of Deere, a litter of Cubs, a team of Wheelhorses ... folks could find them all, and more, at AJ’S GARDEN TRACTOR JAMBOREE, where the people who share a passion for the MIGHTY MITES OF FARM AND HOME found common ground — and some even plowed it

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The Hinrichs family, Andy, Lisa and their son AJ, have been hosting AJ’s Garden Tractor Jamboree since 2010. “There’s a lot of friendship that goes on [at the show],” Andy said, “and you’re not going to meet a better bunch of people.”

But before it was a jamboree, it was just a dad and his son enjoying garden tractor shows together and meeting others who shared their interests — and that helped get the gears in motion to start one of their own in 2010. In the decadeplus since then, AJ’s Garden Tractor Jamboree has brought thousands of people — tractor enthusiasts, families and farmers — to the Hinrichs’ compound to show off their rides, swap parts and swap stories, and share their passion for the machines that do more than just mow.

This year’s event was May 20, and attracted about 350 different tractors old and new, and more than 400 people, also both old and new — some who’ve been coming for years and others who stopped by for the first time. The first jamboree attracted 150 tractors. While the jamboree is named after AJ, Andy runs the show, with wife Lisa, AJ, and friends helping out to make the event a must-see stop on the garden tractor show circuit.

Most jamborees feature a parade around the property, plow sessions, a poker run, a gravel pile tractors can work, a snail’s pace race, a balancing demonstration where tractors try to balance on top of a trailer bed, and a chain pile contest — and anything else the Hinrichs’ and their friends come up with.

In addition, the Blackhawk Crossing 4-H club, which the Hinrichs are members of, has an auction of tractor parts, baked goods and other items to help raise money for the club.

“It’s interesting to hear from people who have never been here before say, ‘Holy cow, I had no idea it was like that, it was a lot of fun,’” Andy said. “It was something they had never experienced. In fact, there are many people around here who haven’t heard of it yet, but that number is getting fewer now.”

JAMBOREE cont’d to page 27

The parade kicked off the day’s fun, right after the national anthem was played, and then it was AJ’s time to shine in the event as he lead the parade around the property on one of his tractors, giving everyone a chance to see the procession of power.

This year’s turnout at the show wasn’t the only big deal. AJ’s graduation party was the next day, and many longtime attendees who watched him grow up through the years offered him their heartfelt congratulations during the show.

“I thought it went good,” AJ said. “It was one of our bigger turnouts, and everyone had a great time. You meet new people every year, and there are people who have come to the show every year, and it’s good to see them all.”

The Hinrichs’ set aside areas where tractors could get a workout plowing a field, proving that they still pack plenty of power, no matter how old they are.

Andy said that one attendee from Detroit who brought his tractor to this year’s show enjoyed having the room to see what his tractor could do.

“When we were all done plowing, he came over to me and told me, ‘I know you have that all smoothed out, but can I do some more plowing out there?’ I didn’t care,” Andy said. “But it hit me: The reason that people like him like to plow like that is because they don’t have that opportunity. We can all mow grass with them, but most town people don’t have an area to plow with. This gives them the opportunity to bring their tractors

out and plow, disk, roto-till, whatever.”

Another popular event is a race that’s pretty slow-going. The Slow Tractor Race has become more popular with each Jamboree, Andy said. Instead of a race to see who’s the fastest, the slowest one wins. Racers creep ever so slowly — no stopping allowed — from the starting line along a 10-foot track.

Just how slow can they go? You might be surprised.

“It’s become quite the competition, and a very competitive part of the show during the afternoon,” Andy said. “We now have three lines, because some guys have decided to literally build the slowest tractors on the planet, and it’ll take them probably two and a half hours to get to that short line. That’s how slow it is moving. It’s incredible.”

Garden tractors aren’t the only exhibits at the jamboree: Andy is an avid collector of ag memorabilia, and opens up a few of his smaller buildings where he houses machines and tools. One building is dedicated solely to farm wrenches, another to his impressive collection of garden tractors old and new. Another building that he’s dubbed the Hinrichs Power Museum has a collection of hit-and-miss engines from more than 100 years ago. Collecting is in the family genes: His parents, Lee and Kathy, operate the Hinrichs Farm Museum of agricultural memorabilia near Coleta in Whiteside County (see the “What a Barn Find” in the Spring 2023 Ag Mag, at issuu.com/ shawmedia/docs/svm_agmag_021023).

Whether it’s catering to the casual fan or the hardcore horsepower historians, the jamboree has become a place where people can catch up with old friends, make new ones, and find people who share their passion. The event has even become a destination for part-seekers and partswappers. Some find what they’re looking for while they’re there, and others have already found it, setting up the deal beforehand on social media or tractor forums and picking up their parts at the jamboree.

The jamboree is one of the first events among the Midwest’s garden tractor shows, which pop up all summer until early October. Those who often make the rounds from show to show sometimes strike up longer conversations at the Hinrichs’ jamboree because of all of the time they’ve spent away from each other during the winter.

“A lot of us, we call each other ‘tractor buddies,’ and we call each other that because we only see each other at tractor shows,” Andy said. “When the last show

ends in September or October, we don’t really see these guys until the show season starts again in May. You’re always so happy at that first show — ‘I haven’t seen you in a long time, Dave,’ ‘How’s it going, Bob?’ ‘Where am I going to see you next?’ — just the camaraderie and the friendships within the tractor community are probably more superior to the show itself. There’s a lot of friendship that goes on, and you’re not going to meet a better bunch of people.”

Before starting their own show, the Hinrichs made the rounds at the regional garden tractor shows. One time, after attending the Little G Expo in Dyersville, Iowa, they came up with an idea to have a show of their own and modeled it on that one.

“We had this crazy idea, and we’re like, ‘If they could have a show, why can’t we have a show?’” Andy said. “Their show was in August, and we decided to pick May because we didn’t want to interfere with their show, and decided that May was a good time to have it because we could make our show the first one of the year.”

JAMBOREE cont’d to page 29

At the time, AJ was just starting off riding, hopping on an old Jacobsen and Bolens, and using a pedal extender to reach the clutch. His parents named the event after their only son as a reflection of his passion for the machines.

“We put clutch extensions on the clutch that were about 8 inches long, so he could sit in his seat and drive it,” Andy said. “He didn’t have to stretch his leg out for what seemed like a million miles to drive the tractor. He always liked to operate them.”

AJ wasn’t the only kid at the first shows; others came too, with their parents or grandparents, and have since become regular attendees. Both Andy and Lisa have enjoyed seeing the children grow up through the years. Getting children interested in garden tractors is another aspect of the show, and this year they brought in a bounce house to attract more to the show.

Lisa helps out with concessions and event preparation, but her time to shine in the event is overseeing the 4-H auction. She’s enjoyed seeing what people bring over the help her club, from small things to whole tractors.

“I think it’s awesome that all of the kids who come out get involved and that there are things for them to do,” Lisa said. “The crowd is just so supportive and they’re very generous in the 4-H auction.”

The 2020 show was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic, and with some restrictions still in place, the following

year’s show took place on a smaller scale — but the auction was anything but small. That year, a restored Cub Cadet 100 was donated and fetched around $6,500 on a Facebook Live auction — with proceeds going to the Blackhawk Crossings’ membership dues, community service projects, and parade floats.

AJ has benefitted from his involvement in 4-H, and proceeds to his next chapter in life away from home. He also has a passion for trains and plans to work for the Iowa Northern short line, which is based in Waterloo and has lines from Cedar Rapids to the Minnesota border. His interest in trains also is evident in maintaining a small park next to a wooden bridge over a Burlington Northern Santa Fe line near his home (Read “While working on a park on day” in the Fall 2021 issue of Ogle County Living, at issuu.com/shawmedia/docs/ svm_ocl_090621 or find “The Old Railroad Bridge” on Facebook to learn more about the park).

Even though he leaves an empty nest at home, AJ plans to continue to be a fixture at future jamborees, helping his parents promote a community of ag enthusiasts near and far, young and old.

“I like visiting with everybody and seeing everybody again,” AJ said. “I have some friends there that I only see once or twice a year, so it’s good to see them at the show, and seeing all of the different garden tractors show up.” n

Cody Cutter can be reached at 815-632-2532 or ccutter@shawmedia.com.

Earlier this year, Sauk Valley Media — publisher of the Gazette and Telegraph, along with the magazine you hold in your hands — put out a call for folks to send us photos of life on the farm, for a Favorite Farm Photos contest and accompanying special publication in the newspapers. Something must have clicked with our readers — besides just their cameras — because they responded by sending us more than 50 photos. From cute kids and cuddly calves to scenic sunsets and the miracle of life, it was clear from seeing these photos that our readers have a knack for capturing the heart of America’s heartland. We enjoyed seeing the photos so much that we wanted to share some with our Ag Mag readers. On the following pages are just some of the photos. If you want to see the rest, the special section is posted at issuu.com/shawmedia/docs/svm farm 052723. A limited number of print copies are also available by calling our Dixon office at 815-632-2592.

“Multi-generation

“Love at first sight” — One of our fainting goats, Aspen, and her first doeling, Magnolia.

“Spring baby” — Mom welcoming her new baby, in Morrison.

SUBMITTED BY CATHE HARVEY

“Happy goats” — These fainting goats are enjoying a moment togethe r.

SUBMITTED BY SHAWN SWEENEY

“Momma and baby” — Wait, what? I can jump off here?

SUBMITTED BY MITCHELL DIXON

Royal Palm and her baby, taking a walk.

“Foggy Fall Morning” — Labor Day morning, 2018, we pulled over and snapped this photo along the road.

“Beauty after a loss” — Our old barn went down in one of the storms we had recently. Thankfully, it was going to be torn down, so it was empty.

“Harvest”

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ROCK FALLS

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