Ep. 24 - Local Farmers: Dustin & Tanner Caston

Anna is out out of town this week, so Tyler reached out to a couple local farmers, Dustin & Tanner Caston.  They operate the fruit and vegetable operation on Caston Farms growing  blueberries, blackberries, elderberries, apples, vegetables & formerly peaches.  Also dabbling in raising dairy cows to produce raw milk.   They discuss how they got into agriculture and a little bit how they run their operation.

Transcript

A little bit different setup. We're here at one part of Caston Farms and we're doing a kind of a guest. Actually, I guess I would be the guest. I loaded up all the stuff and brought it out here to the farm. But Anna's in Virginia this week. Her nephew graduated from ROTC. I think that I'm not for sure makes him a higher officer, little Paige. But I'm here with Dustin Caston. And Tanner, he had to run and apparently some calves got out and he had to go check them and he had choice words when he left. Yeah. 

Part of the farm. 

I guess that's what Jim was wanting. But this is on this side is Dustin. Dustin Caston. We kind of look alike. 

A little bit. 

But I thought, you know, for this week, just I could get a farmer pretty easy. I know these guys, they have their, they're running an operation. So it's like, well, I'll go over and talk to them. And we should probably talk funny stories from when we were kids. And then kind of what they're doing. And some maybe what their goals are in agriculture or in farming, what they hope to do. But so Dustin, You said you'd listened a little bit before. I've told a lot of stories about our times as children, like stuff we got into. We try to keep the PG rated stuff, you know? But I don't know. You remember anything from when we were kids? 

I mean, just growing up on the farm, you know, we'd always have the migrant workers come in and they was always teaching us, teaching us different words. 

Yeah, we learned, I remember that one, shoot, how many years in a row did we start doing that? We'd, what would happen is we'd, during the summer, we eat fruits and vegetables around here. Yeah. But I remember like with me and Dustin Tanner's job would be down there to weigh the berries. And there are all sorts of, looking back now, a lot of crazy funny stuff happened. 

Yeah. 

I remember like one time somebody had brought boxing gloves and that was, it was the summer that Cameron hung out and stayed. man, he is a wild man. I think I talked about the time he opened the porta potty on the lady. Oh, man. 

He thought somebody had just locked it. 

Yeah. He yanked. He yanked. And we just sit there. I didn't know what to say. Like, hey, maybe there's a reason. 

As soon as he opened that, he slammed that door. 

And she yelled. Yeah. That was funny. Oh, man. But there's like tensions that get high. There were some folks, I got stung by a bee one time that swelled up my hand. But it seems like that same time was those guys almost got into a fist fight. 

Do you remember that? Well, the one guy was trying to help the other guy, because he just had all kinds of smushed berries. 

And we're like, we can't. It's just green once, smash once. And it's like, well, we can't like take this. We're just going to have to throw it out. And the guy's there trying to tell him. And it's. 

He was like Guatemalan. 

Yeah. 

He was a little bitty guy. 

And I mean that all of a sudden that old man like just pushed him and he squared up on him like that. I was just like, oh no. I remember Lane was there because Lane was like. 

Yeah. 

But those were good times. I think it. that's why I kind of got into agriculture. Right. From doing it back when we were kids and just being raised up. So a little bit, what do y'all do here? 

Well, I mean, we grow blueberries. 

And y'all, yeah, I was telling someone the other day that they had some plants that were older than me. 

Yeah. 

I'm 38 and they've been doing it since before then. 

Right. They usually last, till about good production, like 20 years, somewhere around there. Then they start going downhill. 

Yeah. And y'all, y'all planted some more. I guess talk about that process, what y'all do there? 

Planting them. 

Yeah, like. 

Well, at first we go in and get cuttings. And then off of the new growth from that year in the wintertime? 

So about the time you'd might normally prune. 

Right, yeah. And we get cuttings and then we'll put them in the fridge until, early, early, well, right before spring, kind of, late winter. And then we'll, right before spring, we'll start putting them in pots and we'll go get peat moss, mix it water, and then we'll put them in pots and then stick them in a bed. 

Like a bed, like it's a raised bed type thing is what they make. 

And then they'll sprout it, get leaves, and get taller, bigger, and grow roots. And then from there, we'll transplant them to a pot. And raise them in a pot. 

And so how long, a lot of people have the misperception of how long that takes you. So about how long is it from you take the cutting one year till it's going in the ground that y'all do. 

Okay, so we'll take the cutting and that's a year right there in the bed and then another year in the pot. and then the neck we'll let them grow a year in the pot and then we'll transplant them to the field so that's three years right there to get. 

Them to the field and then what probably another couple. 

Of years and then another couple years because once we get them to the field see a lot of people will just let them grow up and just have the berries and stuff on them. But what you're supposed to do is take the blooms off that first year in the field. That way they put all their energy into the roots to grow one. And then, but the next year we'll start thinking. 

And y'all look at like pH, right? 

Yeah, the pH is a big deal. You want more acidic soil. 

Yeah, it's like a four between 4.5 and 5.5. And so. 

Right. Adding sulfur and a lot of sulfur. 

And I come out here one day, y'all got those sulfur tests, yeah. 

We just got them in the mail. 

Okay, good. 

Yeah, so we're. 

We drove down there, the Tory, they had, did y'all see them or not? 

Tanner did. 

Tanner did. Her office come up and kind of toured around and I was driving, I caught up with them, kind of rode around and it's looking, it looks real good down there where y'all put those new, like the two year old bushes look really good and then the one years look really good. 

Yeah. 

And not like year in the field. 

Right, yeah, they're starting to really look good. 

Y'all planted new blackberries. 

Yeah, we got the Ponca variety. It's supposed to be the sweetest blackberry that EU of A's come up with. 

Yeah, I've heard them talk about it. I think I've got to try one. You know Austin Kinnan, he's the ag teacher there. We got a little bit of wind. This is the first one I've done outside. Austin Kinnan, some of his kids are in our 4-H program. they grow all sorts of stuff. And he had some poncas and I tried some over there and it is a sweet berry. And they've like from the specialists that I've heard talk that it's a really good one. Off the top of my head for like home production, because again, y'all are doing it commercially. We'll get it to what y'all do with that. But like in a home orchard, we have a lot of folks that listen that would want to do that. I think You could do them. They'd be like a recommended variety for a home orchard. 

Right. 

There's Tanny Man. He must have got the calves in. Yeah. But blueberries, blackberries, what else do you have? 

We got just a few apple trees and peach trees, but they hardly ever make it. Yeah. 

I guess we'll back up and say, what is y'all's process with the blackberries? We talked to kind of what y'all do with your blueberries to get them started. 

Blackberries are a little different because on those you can plow up like where the blackberries are and get the roots and plant the roots on those. And so, and then those, they'll start producing, see the ones we planted this year, the new variety, we had to, we went and bought them and they were a plant. And so we bought those and we planted those out in the field. And so there's going to be a few on them this year that we just planted this early spring. 

Did y'all get any of the, y'all just did Ponca, did y'all do any of the primocane fruit and varieties? And I noticed, so I planted a couple of Navajo, normally like it's the second year growth that are these second year, I guess. 

Yeah. 

It would be their second year. 

Yeah, it would be their second year. 

Okay. 

Yeah, and they'll shoot up one, their first cane. 

That prima cane. 

Yeah, and it's going to have blackberries on it, but then they're going to shoot up another cane And you can get a second picking off of those. 

Yeah, those prime arcs. Yeah. And so. I've heard how a lot of guys like use them as like to increase their season. So like when do y'all normally start picking blackberries? 

They're just a little lighter than blueberries, somewhere around towards the. middle to end of June somewhere. 

So what they do with them primocane fruiters is they'll like mow them down and then they'll regrow and then they'll just do one crop like towards the fall and it'll extend. So you pick from what, say, mid-June to maybe end of July? 

Right, yeah. 

And then if it works right, August or September, you have that other crop coming off that you can sell. But so, Tanner, you had to run. What was, where'd you go? 

I had to go get some calves out of some vegetables. 

Was there a bunch? 

There wasn't many. Not Tanner. Somebody left the gate open. 

I wonder who it was. 

I don't know who it was. It wasn't me. I ain't go with it. 

It wasn't. 

Me. Because I got down there. And we got our vegetables, where we got them at this year. We got electric fence around them to keep deer and stuff out of them. And your dad's cows. But we got electric fence all the way around, but we haven't put our gate up at the front. 

Yeah. 

And so they just went through that gate. I thought, well, we need to get that gate put up. 

Yeah. 

But I got behind them and pushed them out and they knew exactly where the hole was. There's a gate down there, but a metal gate. Goes below the filter there. It was wide open. I thought, well, somebody either didn't shut it or blew open. 

Dad, they were putting up the electric fence the other day, I guess, to turn them in, rotate them over there to hit around his house. But I don't know if they ever got them up. So they must have started to do it. And then something happened. 

Yeah, but they There was probably 10 or so. 

They're funny like that. It's like, oh, they won't find that. We'll be all right. We'll be all right. They won't get in there. And it's like, what's that over there? That looks like an open gate. 

Yeah. Well, you see, I didn't, whenever they started running, I thought, me and dad burned some brush piles down there. Well, I'm pretty sure there was a burning ban on them, but I ain't sure. There wasn't, as far as we're concerned. Yeah, I mean, I don't think there was, but those brush piles, they burnt. And there was one right against his fence, and I know it burnt up a few of his posts. And I thought, well, they might have got out there, but they ran right to that gate, and they knew exactly where they said it, you know? 

What is it they say? I can neither confirm nor deny that there was a burn ban. 

I don't think there was. But that, because I mean it got out a little bit just on list. It was just burning some brown grass. It's, you know. Yeah, that's how all our burn is. Yeah, we never have a burn and it goes good. 

Yeah, I know. Like when I said the Forest Service, it was like the, when they were doing them burns, it was like, Checking humidity, wind. They were worried about where the smoke was going to go. 

We're just worried about if we can get lit or not. What happens after that? Because whenever we burnt that, dad's like, ow, it won't get out. And I was like, oh, okay. And when we lit that thing and that day started burning, I thought, my gosh. Well, it wound up getting over on Lewis and that's like, we better get that put out. And I was like, well, we ain't got nothing. So we had to cut off some Cedar limbs. We's out there putting that with cedar limbs. How about my gosh? 

I've said I've had to call the fire department twice to my house. It's your house? Yes, like it's kind of embarrassing, but you know it happened like a So I was burning, like I got a bunch of Chinese privet and stuff around like my house. It's growed up in like the chain link fence. And like I'd cut it and then like burn a box and then burn that stuff. Well, I was burning one time and the wind just shifted and it like went into like not my backyard. Like in the, where my neighbors Field is just sage grass and you've got that sage grass and just. 

It's like gasoline. 

Yeah, it was clean. It looked really good for a while. But a bunch of tree of heaven, like a bunch of like ceresa lespedesa popped up in there and a bunch of tree of heaven. So it's like I need to burn it again. 

I need to get caught out again. 

Yeah, but the second time it was. I think I could have got it put out, but Lauren panicked. 

Yeah. 

One of them type things. 

Yeah. Let's see. We was burning a field off one time down underneath the hill. And it was me, Dustin, and Dad, and Chaz. Chaz, he was with us, and we was in a gray Chevrolet. And we got out, and Chaz, and it was coming, you know, the fire was burning pretty good. Chaz, everybody got out of the truck and Chaz locked the door. Yeah. And we couldn't get in it and that fire was coming towards the truck. Luckily, we had a skid steer down there, so we'd kind of be able to get it, you know, where it wouldn't burn the truck down. But we thought we was going to have to bust the window and have to get in it. Luckily, I forget we finally got it open, but yeah. 

Well, that like that's good education. Like what? We like, I know the Forest Service, or at least the Forest Commission, like if you have property and you need help burning, I know they charge a little bit, but they can set up a help, a controlled burn. I mean, around here, we're connected to family. So it's like, if it gets out. 

Not too big of a deal. 

It's not too big of a deal. But like, at the Forest Service, they were checking everything, weather, humidity and stuff. And then like Tanner said, most farmers around here, it's like, we've got to do it. And this is a kind of a good day. 

Yeah, that's how we always miss, Today's the day to burn. Today's the day to burn. And it just, sometimes you don't mean that, we burned the fill off one time. 

Yeah, that thing will shoot up an ember and if the wind catches it'll cross your fire lines. Y'all did, y'all also went through, y'all went through NRCS and y'all got into wildlife and did fire breaks and some of that burning was part of that. 

Yeah, but I mean, Some of it went good. 

Even helped with some of that. 

Yeah. 

I mean, burning, it's good for the overall health of wooded areas for us. It's a good thing. It's just, you do have to be careful. We know from experience. And they're funny stories. 

Yeah. Oh yeah. I mean, me and dad, we burnt the field off dinner one day and I just knew it was going to get out, but it burnt fine and didn't have no problem. 

I remember like a fire got out over here near the apartments. 

Jim? Yeah. 

I think he's burning his trash. He got the apartments on fire. I think that is not good. I might edit that part. It's trash. We can neither confirm nor deny. It's probably boxes. Yeah, just boxes. 

Cardboard boxes. 

Yeah, I shoot. That's how I start the fire at my house. Like I still got that privet and I'll have a cardboard box. Got to get something to burn. Did y'all like I was listening to a podcast earlier and they're talking about like they do in the 4-H program, like fire starting. I might need y'all to come teach. 

I'll break my big ladder. 

They're talking about how they, like, I've done it before in like a camp where, like, I'll give the kids one match and be like, all right, who can get a fire started first? 

One match is hard. 

Yeah. I mean, it's got to, you got to have everything ready. Yeah. And hope you put it just, and it's weird. Like, I guess kids don't have good motor control or something. Yeah. And it's like, Snap. 

Yeah. 

You got to. 

I always carry a big ladder. 

Yeah. 

Everywhere I go. 

That's the best way. 

Somebody said something. Hey, can I borrow a ladder? He's like, yeah, here. And he's like, you smoke? I'm like, no, but I carry a ladder everywhere I go. I'm like, you never know when you might need one. 

Well, dad carried a pocket knife, a ladder, and those little... 

Oh, yeah, I carry. I mean, I carry a knife and ladder and keys every, you know, every day, but... That's, of course, Dustin or Dad will borrow my liner and I'll never get it back. Go buy me another one, but. 

I've gotten a lot of pens that way. Someone will hand me a pen and sign and it's like, this is mine now. I'm mad about losing my pocket knives. 

Yeah, Dustin, keep up with his. 

Yeah, like I've. usually I'll wear a couple of my pants. Like, if they don't get dirty, I'll wear them like two or three days in a row. Going on a third day on these pants. And have, just leave your pocket knife in there. That's how I've lost a lot of them is, which pair of pants are they in? 

No, I. I keep up. I'm pretty good about keeping up with my stuff. 

You always have been, like I have not. Like I remember, you remember when we were squirrel hunting over there in the forest and I had, I'd bought me some Wiley X sunglasses. I'm like, I'm wearing them. I didn't even need them. It wasn't even sunny. But I was like, I'm going to keep up with them and I'm going to get used to carrying them. And I like rolled them up on my head as we were going through the woods. Sure enough, got knocked off somewhere. Cheap stuff from now on. Yeah. 

Well, that's, I've always worn them Oakley sunglasses. He's like, oh, I'd be scared I'd lose them. I'm like, well, you pay some money for them, you'll keep up with them. But he still loses stuff. 

I've kept up with my sunglasses. 

Well, yeah. I'm not good at like hats. I'll get a hat and Misplaced the thing. I'm like, where is that? And it's usually like it fell behind the couch. 

Right, just misplaced it. 

Yeah, it's what I did. I got a spot on the table. I said all my stuff out whenever I like, if I take my pants off and they're going to get washed, I said everything right there. I got a certain spot where I said all my stuff at. 

It's a good plan. 

And yeah, always keep up with my stuff. Pretty good. 

Yeah. Well, We're talking when you pulled up about like Dustin talked a little bit about how y'all do the blueberries and we got on the blackberries. Which is your favorite? Like Blueberries. Y'all's favorite to grow? 

I mean, I like blueberries better. 

Like to eat them? 

Yeah, eating wise. I mean, blackberries, I guess. 

I get blackberries. You done with it. 

Throw it. But I mean in the yard. I guess a good blackberry. I've never had good luck of getting them. They're always so sour and almost need a dog turd to get the taste out of my mouth. Dustin, one time he grabbed me one, he's like, this is going to be good. When I put it in my mouth, I was like, no, it ain't. 

It probably got stung by like a stink bug or something. 

I've heard every one of them I eat gets stung by a stink bug. I like them, in a pie. That's, about it. 

I like when they get like those stink bugs. I guess we can talk about how you'll manage for pests and weeds and stuff. But like those stink bugs suck on it or something or sting it. 

They do something. 

It tastes just like they smell. 

Oh yeah. I mean, it was like I say, every one of them, I can't never get a good one. That's why, you know, these new black birds we got, they're supposed to be On the sweetest one. So I was like, maybe, I'll find, a blackberry I like. Yeah. Maybe it won't taste like crap. 

Yeah. I mean, some people like, I don't like tomatoes at all. I can't eat one. Some people be like. 

Eat them like an apple. 

I like them on like a hamburger sandwich. 

I can handle them in chili and stuff like that. 

I can't see it. I cannot see it like it. If it's, I don't, it can't be big chunks. 

Yeah. 

And it's got to be ketchup. I can do ketchup. I can do salsa. I can't do chunky salsa. Like if, like in Rotel or something, you dip that in, it's got to be hidden. And if I ignore it, I can eat it. But if I see it, like if I'm like, and there's a chunk. So it's more of. It's the texture and I don't know. The texture is a big thing. Yeah, I guess. And like, I guess the flavor's okay because I do like salsa, but it's just seeing that tomato. I'm just like, no, thanks. 

Yeah. I've gotten better. I can eat it in chili and stuff like that. And it don't bother me, but I ain't just going to go eat a tomato. 

Yeah. 

I don't. It's just kind of like onion. I like Like onion, but it's got to be cooked. I don't raw onion could be heartburn. 

I could do a raw onion, like an apple. 

I can't do that. I like them cooked. Other than anything cooked, I don't want no part of them. 

Yeah. Do y'all do like any food preservation? And it's not on this episode, so we'll probably mostly talk egg, but do y'all do any food preservation stuff? 

Freezing it, if that counts. That's about it. You can make a freezer jam. Yeah. No, I'd like to. I've seen people canning on meat and stuff. I'd like. 

I've seen Anna do it. looks pretty easy. If you can follow a recipe and follow instructions, you should be able to can if you're, from what I understand about it, and just make sure your equipment's working properly. 

Yeah. Right. 

But then it's just for following the rules. 

Yeah. My wife thought about canning once. She bought some yars and that's about as far as she made it. 

Yeah, I would like to learn it, but I'm just not into it. 

Yeah, same here. I'm just not into it and too busy doing other stuff. 

Yeah, I got more important things to do besides canned food. 

Reset. We're talking a little bit about pressure cannon. Tanner's trying to make people mad. What'd you say? You got better things to do? Yeah. 

A cannon war ain't gonna like me. 

I mean, if you know how to do it, it's a good skill to have. It's just like, what do you like to do? 

It's not work. 

But that seems like all you do. 

Yeah, it seems like that's all we do is work, but. 

You should take up a hobby like gardening. Yeah, that's right. My wife, she's like, we ought to play the garden. I was like, why? 

I was like, I garden every day. I was like, I ain't going to come home and garden. Yeah. I was like, that's That's the last thing I want to do. 

Yeah, but like you're developing skills like propagating blueberries. Like I can probably have a whole class on propagating blueberries and people love to know how to do that stuff. Yeah. So if you look at it like, you know, one day, Like I've thought about, I mean, if you got serious, I bet people would buy those plants from if you. 

We have some we're going to sell them from the fruit stand. 

Yeah. And y'all, again, doing them in peat moss. So if it's not a natural soil, you don't have to have that. Nursery man's license. Right. Yeah. 

So that's what I told Dad. I was like, you know, we're probably missing out on a lot of money. I was like, because we grow all those vegetables in that greenhouse. I was like, you know, we've got all the people to buy those little plants. I was like, because. 

That's kind of like, I think we could do it, like run a nursery. 

Because people, you know, they'll want to plant a garden. They'll do it and get it all and they'll plant it. forget about it in a few weeks, I mean, a lot of people, but I mean that's bugs, but get in them. 

In this next half of the segment, let's talk about that. Like I've told people, we have a lot of people moving in. And more people like they hear about organic and they hear about all natural or regenerative practices. And there is something to that with me and soil health, I think regenerative agriculture will be like a thing. And it'll be interesting with this push to see like how well and some of those pilot program, how well did they improve the soil. But here in Arkansas, like I tell people that are wanting to grow fruit trees as a homeowner, it's like, you can attempt to try to be organic to where you're, you know, you're not, yeah, maybe as far as like getting the soil right. But when it comes to insect and disease pressure. 

You got to spray it. Yeah. I mean, just like peaches. 

They're the worst. 

You can't, you can't grow an organic peach. I mean, you, know, your tree might have a few, but you ain't gonna have very many on there. 

Yeah. 

And it's like, it's. 

Everything loves a peach. 

Everything loves a peach. It's like, I've heard people like, oh, you grow enough for everybody, the bugs, the people you want to sell to. And there are some like practices, but it's like y'all is a commercial operation. It's just, you don't have, like I've seen them where they go out and like, Yeah, you can't do it. You all couldn't do nothing like that. No. 

I mean, the guy we buy our peaches from up there in Harrison, you know, he sprays. 

Yeah, he's conventional. 

Yeah, I mean, of course he got a lot of peaches too. 

And it's a weekly thing and that's something a miss people think that they're, you know, they're just spraying like pesticides in general has a negative connotation to it. And I, you know, Sure, maybe it's, I wouldn't want something sprayed with glyphosate if I can avoid it. But y'all are using fungicides, insecticides, and using them responsibly, like not spraying during blooms. So the bees and pollinators can be out there and out there scouting, checking, seeing when, you know, when the bugs are there. And so with blueberries and blackberries. Do y'all worry about that spotted wing drosophila, the SWD fly that'll... 

Like the little fruit fly. 

The little fruit fly, yeah. 

You know, it's, that's the only thing we have to watch out for on blueberries and little fruit fly. But as far as... 

But bug, yeah, insects, yeah, that's... 

And we spray this spray that it's a one day that you got to wait. So it's not like something that's real, Yeah, real toxic. 

It's a one day withdrawal that it's got a short half-life where with the sunlight, that it's going to be gone. 

Right, yeah. It don't last. 

Yeah. 

It's the stuff that spray on the vegetables. It ain't, but. You don't even have to wait on it, do you? No. 

Yeah, zero day withdrawal. And speaking on that, like for like some homeowners gardening, like there's some herbicides like that, what we'd use to kill weeds, especially in like pasture and hay situations that are those zero day withdrawals where we can spray it and cattle can, horses can graze right behind it. And I have a lot of people that I went out on one to look at some tomatoes that look like they had herbicide damage. And what can happen is that animal eats that grass and that chemical can pass through and it's still in the manure and people use it as like compost or something or like till it into their soil and then just a tomato, a little bit of herbicide will Right. Yeah. But y'all using fungicides and then y'all do have to control the weeds and there's all sorts of weeds out there that. 

Yeah, we try to use pre-emerge stuff if we can. Yeah. That way we stay away from. 

But it is y'all working. It's not y'all just spraying one and done. I think that's also a misperception. Yeah. They'll call and be like, I, you know, I've I sprayed my peach tree and I've got a, or I've got a disease, but I sprayed. How many? Well, how many times? Well, I sprayed one time. And it's like, no, it's. 

Peach tree for like fungicides, you got to spray every week. Yeah. If it rains, you got to spray right after the rain. No matter if you just sprayed the day before. If it rains, you got to spray the next day it's sunny. Yeah. On peach trees. Well, and apples too and stuff like that. 

Yes. And it's like, people have the misperception that it's like, oh, farmers are trying to kill us with these herbicides. And it's like, no, farmers aren't trying to kill you. They're, you know, they're trying to produce food. And there's, in certain climates, there's only, there's certain ways you have to do farm practices. So, but y'all manage, y'all soil tests, manage soil fertility. And We talked a little bit about what y'all did, blueberries, blackberries. We didn't talk to the elderberries. How's that going? It's good. How'd y'all do that? 

On the elderberries, we did go around and dig up some just wild plants around here. And they're doing pretty good, but we also bought some from inertia. So I selected some Bob Gordon and Wildwood. 

So I selected like an improved variety. 

And they're doing. 

Yeah, they're doing really good. 

They're growing like a weed. People treat them like a weed. Once you figure out what an elderberry looks like. 

You see them everywhere. 

See them everywhere. 

Yeah, I was bush hogging and down in the rows the other day and I was in the bush hog a bunch of them down because they just pulled up. 

We planted them in rows. 

Yeah, but now they're just kind of. 

But they're growing out in the middle. Yeah. 

How do y'all like, do y'all treat them? I've heard you manage them similar to like a blackberry to where you cut them back or do, how do y'all do it? 

Well, we've done just went in there and One guy said, you can just go through there and bush hog them. But we just went and pruned them all the way down. Yeah. 

And they've regrow and they produce that on. That first year. 

First year. 

Getting on that new growth. I've heard about people, do y'all sell the flower? Do y'all ever do that? 

We never have. I remember you talking about it, like getting the flower off of it. 

Yeah, I think it's. There's something about that flower that people buy. I can't remember. 

Just finding the market for them is the main thing, I guess. 

As far as growing? 

No, they're greasy to grow. 

We don't have to spray them. You don't have to spray them. You don't have to do anything to them. 

Yeah, so you, in that situation, like, Let's say you wanted to get organic. 

That would be one. 

That would be one you could do organic. And how to get certified organic is no, none of the restricted, like you can't use commercial fertilizers or like synthetic pesticides. You can use, you can use pesticides in organic, but they got to be like natural and approved, OMRI approved or approved for organic. And for three years, you can't use any of that. And you building towards adopting organic practices, but after that three years, then you could call a certifier in and they could certify you. And you could actually say, we're selling USDA organic elderberries. And if you're doing those practices like that, and you have been for three years, as long as you're not selling over, well, and it's probably for y'all, y'all couldn't do it. Y'all would have to get certified since you're probably selling more than $2,500 worth of agricultural goods. But someone that's not, if you're doing that for three years, you can't use the organic label, but you can say it's grown organic. And it's that's it's really just a marketing thing with the USDA and has to be certified to use that label. But that's cool that y'all technically y'all aren't growing them organic. 

The only thing we've done to those is bush hog around them. 

Yeah, that's it. 

And so y'all do best, got elderberries, peaches, apples. How you managing the apples? 

I don't think we're the same as a peach. 

Do you all prune? I know for there for a minute, the peaches, and again, peaches are hard. It also, they're one of the earliest to bloom out, it seems like. We have, we all still run that. Yeah, they, we used to be set up that we could turn on sprinklers, but time's not worth it. 

Yeah, and they got real bad growed up and we've. 

They got taller than our sprinklers. 

Yeah. 

And. 

Then when everybody's pruning them, we had to go in there with a grapple bucket to get that stuff out. And so I just get all that, get caught on, sprinklers, get caught on, and it just. 

Yeah, but it's so peaches for Arkansas. I would, I know the University of Arkansas's developed some varieties, but like there's White County, I think White River. And I think they're a white peach, but I'm not sure how well those would. 

Just picking a good location for your peaches is another. 

Over there where they're planted, that's a cold spot. It's pretty cold. Yeah. 

That was their grandpa's. 

He's a genius. 

I think he said, I don't care if I make any money. I'm going to grow something. 

I probably, I wouldn't know that, because I mean, that's a terrible spot to plant beaches. And he planted entirely too many. I don't know why he wanted to plant so many beaches. I mean, I mean, it was like. 

They've had some good years. 

Yeah, they have, but they get froze up most years. 

Yeah, what, maybe one out of five years, maybe you'll get a crop. So that wouldn't be worth the time, worth your grandsons time to do it to them anyway. 

But Peaches. They're a lot of. 

They're a lot of work. But the apples, apples is 1 and you might like, you'd be more apt to do it a little bit easier with say less spray because there's less diseases. But the big one that y'all probably most people will have to deal with is fire blight. 

Yeah. 

And So how often do y'all spray the apples? Kind of the same. 

Yeah, it kind of goes on the same. Which they, some of them kind of froze out this year too. 

I think those Arkansas blacks got froze out because we was over looking at them the other day. There wasn't very many on them. Some of the other trees had quite a bit, but those Arkansas blacks, they didn't have very many. 

Yeah. 

It look like. 

But the one thing about the Arkansas black that I've noticed is even if that thing, it'll be, all the leaves will have fire blight, but that thing will still make apples. Yeah. 

Them things are not very good to eat. Deer won't even eat them. 

I've heard you have to, they have to sit for a while. Like as far as like a, you wanted to grow something to eat this winter. 

Yeah. 

Or store for a while. 

I mean, they say they're more for cooking anyways, really. I mean, because they're real hard and tart, Like I say, the deer won't even touch them. 

Good bacon apple. 

Yeah. They'll eat the other ones. 

And then finally, I guess we'll talk a little, y'all do vegetables and you got some dairy cows. 

Yeah. 

We love them cows. If anybody needs some dairy cows, we might make them a good deal. 

Yeah, we'll talk about that. Like vegetables, y'all grow some, like you'll do squash, y'all got zucchini, cucumbers. 

Yeah. 

But yeah, but y'all sell with Arkansas's new law. And we talked about this, I think last week in the episode about selling farmers markets with the new raw milk law. You can sell it at farmers markets and y'all do your own like Y'all got a fruit stand. Yeah. And y'all do several locations. 

Right. 

But yeah, tell us about what that process is like. 

It's terrible. I don't know who'd want to do it. 

What makes it terrible? 

Just having to milk him stupid cows. Well, I mean, it ain't hard. It's easy. 

It's easy. It's just the time. 

Yeah, it goes with anything else. 

It's one of them like monotonous jobs. Yeah. If you made one of them jobs, you'd want to listen to a cool podcast. 

Yeah. I mean, I wouldn't want to milk cows for a living. Yeah. I mean, much I guess about all you ever done, it wouldn't be so bad, but those cows, how much it take? Iron half to milk them and jug it all. it don't take long. 

But it's just, you got, it's every day. 

Every day. 

Every day. It's like, that's one reason why I like never wanted to raise like poultry broiler houses, because it's Maybe like every, what, eight or nine weeks you get a two week vacation or canned. But when you got them chickens, it's like you can't go nowhere. You got to be there all the time. 

I mean, one good thing about the cows, you just milk them. Then after you get done milking, you go do whatever you want. But you know, you got to be there the next day to milk them. 

Yeah. 

You know, it's just. 

So on that, why'd y'all get into farming? 

Just lucky, I guess. Brought up in it. 

Yeah. 

Like I, went, I, as I grew up in it, was like, I want to get away from this. I don't want to do it. This sucks. I don't want to do it. But then it was like, well, I kind of know it. So that's kind of where I'm going to pursue my education. And now it's like, I want to get back into it somehow. 

Come on back. Yeah. 

We got a spot for you. Yeah. If this don't work out. Yeah. If this county county extension thing don't work out, I for sure will be back. Yeah. Because but one thing like I kind of like where I ended up, you know, I like helping people. 

Right. And I like you're good at it. 

Yeah. I like educating farmers. I want to help them. And but I respect agriculture overall, Todd Dill, and it's like I'm very pro-ag. 

Right. Well, I mean, it feeds the world. 

I need to send my neighbor down there too. He asked me one of my neighbors. We had a tornado come through there at 56. Well, there's a tree, it blowed down on the fence. And I was just kind of patching back so my horses wouldn't get out. He's kind of an odd character. I mean, I don't really know him, but I was over fixing that fence and he come up and he had some, I think, some peach trees or something. He's talking about it and he's like, oh, I need to know about these peach trees. And he's like, I don't know anything about them. I was like, no, I don't know nothing about peach trees. And he sits up and I'm like, now I'm like, I ain't got no idea about no peach trees. And I thought, you know what? I should have told him about my cousin. 

This is what you tell him next time you say it's cheaper to buy them. 

Yeah. But just buy them. I wish I don't think he's peach trees ain't. 

You want to be a guest? Hop over here. 

What are you doing? What? Peanut jelly sandwich. Oh, you want a peanut butter and jelly sandwich? All right, we'll go in there. No, come in there in a minute. 

Yeah. How's he now? 

Four. Four. 

Yeah. 

Future farmer right there. 

Future farmer. We got to get all your kids in 4-H. 

Yeah. 

Well, I think we're 4-H is, we're kind of rolling. We got like 120 something kids now. 

Yeah, good grief. Yeah, it's good. All kids. How old you got to be? 

You got to be 5, so. Five. 

It'll be 5 in August. 

Yeah. So as soon, like you can sign up. I mean, if y'all like. 

Got to deal with turtles. He loves turtles. 

So there is like a raising pet aspect to it. So yeah. I mean, he could get, like, maybe. give like a public talk or he could do like a public just to get him used to that's a skill that kids going to have to have is being able to talk in front of people. So at our next Bill come give a public talk about turtles and how cool they are. And Leonardo is the best Ninja Turtle. He loves that one. Oh man, I used to love Ninja Turtles. Like I I even like, I probably shouldn't have done it, but I was kind of testing the vibe of the group. But I did an interview for like this leadership deal I signed up for and they asked about like, what type of leader, what's the type of leader you think's good? And I was like, well, the only thing that's come to my mind to who I think the best leader ever is Leonardo from the Ninja Turtle. And they laughed and I did get in. So yeah, I like to the use of humor. So we're probably do about 10 more minutes and we can kind of, got any funny stuff that's happened to you recently or old stories. I know there's a bunch in my mind and I think of them like away from when it's hard to think of something on the spot. Did y'all do any turkey hunting? 

No, I didn't fool with you. 

Just not many turkeys. 

I told the one about us down here when we saw that old guy. I told him about us. 

We were calling and then all of a sudden we see a guy walking towards us. 

And then he saw us and ran away. 

He ran faster than us. It's probably one of our Rick's buddies. Yeah. 

And then I told him, when me and you got caught about by What was that guy that lived below Sue's? 

Oh, Leonard. Yeah, Leonard Horton, wasn't it? Yeah. 

And I think I was like, that had to have been Lance who caught us in Lance. 

Yeah, I don't know. I mean, he scared the fire out of me. I almost took off running. He's about to see something else. Yeah. I ain't getting, we was just crossing that fence and then he just said, hey, he scared me to death. Hold up, man. What if I shot you? I mean, what if we'd have got shot? Yeah, I mean, golly. But yeah, I don't know who that was. 

No. 

Really? I don't think it was Lance. 

It may have not been Lance. It was a man and a boy. He had on a like a face mask on. I don't. 

He didn't look like Lance. 

I figured he hunted over on Sue. 

Yeah, well, I mean, everybody could. Yeah, Sue didn't care. 

I mean, I don't remember what we said. I don't, you done the talking. I don't think I did. 

I was just kind of trying to mumble, not give away any information. 

You remember that time when I mean he was up on the mast and that one old turd head? 

Oh, it's somebody. 

I can't say it. 

He might be a listener or he'd be like that. I thought them were some nice young boys. 

He didn't think that day. 

No, and we weren't doing anything wrong. 

We was on our place. I don't know. He was like, he was like, barely 30 yards from us looking at his through his binoculars, you know? 

We're like, what? He's like, y'all cross the fence up here. And we're like, no, we come from back here. 

Yeah. And we seen him out in the field walking around. And then meantime, I just went down there and sat down. And then I just looked over and I said, hey, Tyler, there's somebody over there. And he just starts having a big old fit about us being on his place. And we was 100 yards away from his fence. Yeah. I mean, but. 

Yeah. The best, close, best thing about turkeys, we're, I'm not a very good turkey hunter, but you remember that time. 

Man, you were down underneath the hill. Yeah. 

I was like, it's deer season. I'm like grunting with like I grunt and like we'd hear. Oh yeah. And I was like, Tanner, that's got to be a bug or something. 

Yeah. 

And I'd run again and we hear, and I was like, all right, Tanner, it's getting close. Yeah. And like, we flip around the tree to try to just spot what it was. And it's about a billion turkeys stick off line. 

Yeah, that was up on the mountain. Yeah. See, I remember that one time when me and you went turkey. 

You need to take your shotgun. 

This is after, I think this was after you couldn't kill him anymore in like the fall after they had done. 

Didn't you take one time go down there and you took your bow? 

Yeah, me and Tyler, that's what I was about to say. Me and Tyler went down there. 

We went turkey hunting down there and took our, yeah, took my bow. 

Tyler took his bow and I was sitting up in this cedar jig gonna film me. I didn't have a gun or nothing. I don't know why. And Tyler, he said over against the fence and this old turkey, I mean, he come in. And he just sitting in that fence courses web wire. And I mean that turkey just sitting in that fence going back and forth. It's strutting and yelling. 

If I had stayed back where you were, I could have drawn my bow, but I was just like up against a cedar tree that didn't have hardly any limbs. 

Yeah. And I thought, man, I could have killed that turkey. And then after he went off, we tried getting him back. 

And he kept gobbling. 

Yeah, he just kept on getting further away, but. 

That one time we would have been successful. 

It would have been because you set up and you started calling. 

I mean, bam. 

He come in there and he's a pretty big turkey, too. 

He's a good one. Yeah. I don't know why there ain't a lot around here. I see them every now and then and I used to see flocks of them. Well, I have an idea of why, but it's a bunch of things. 

Yeah, there's probably several things. 

Yeah. I mean, of course, pigs. I say pigs. 

Pigs and varmints like raccoons will get into them. But then there is a portion to cutting hay this time of year. They're nesting. There's a portion of that. 

I've always heard that people using turkey litter. 

It's probably not best for them. 

So diseases and stuff. 

It could, I could imagine. 

But I mean, they're fun to hunt, but they're just so few. I just think you're going to walk my **** off to kill turkey. 

Every time you'd go with Tyler, you'd go. 

Every time we'd go with Tyler, he killed me. He walked me. I was like, man, I hope he don't call me. You want to go turkey hunting? 

I don't feel like walking. We were, yeah. 

We're going on an adventure. 

Oh man, you walked up on the mountain one time going turkey hunting. 

I thought, yeah, me and Tyler. We would park at the foot of the mountain and walk all the way up to the top. 

I wanted to increase our odds. But we never did get that. So I must have been doing it wrong. Yeah. 

I'm kind of lazy. 

I'm more or less just like the. Like the thought we're on an adventure type thing. And if we get anything, it's a better story. 

Look at least you're on top of the hill. 

It's kind of like that, what's Steve Ranilla say? You want to kind of suffer? Yeah, suffer a little bit. That was before his time. 

Yeah, well, we done some suffering. Or well, I did anyways. You know, I was even younger then. I didn't like it. I think you don't now. 

Well, I mean, we're right at probably an hour. You got anything else? Who's that? My wife. Oh, it's important. All right. Well, got to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and answer the phone. Thanks for listening. Thanks for being on here. I'll have to get you back on. 

Yeah, for sure. 

I think it'll be good. All right. Probably be out tomorrow.