Stewards of Their Family’s Heritage: The Paustian Family

When thinking about the small, relatively rural town of Walcott, Iowa, many will think of the place known for bringing drivers from near and far, the Iowa 80 Truckstop, also known as the World’s Largest Truck Stop. What many don’t know is just behind the famous truck stop is a farming operation started in the mid-1800s when a man named Frederick Paustian ventured to the U.S. from Germany and landed in Walcott. It’s an operation that has remained in the Paustian family since.

“The farm was started in the mid-1800s when great-great-great-grandpa Frederick came over from Germany and built the house here at the home farm that I grew up in and my parents still live,” six-generation hog and row crop farmer, Mike Paustian said. “Paustians have been farming around here since then.”

The Paustians currently have a farrow-to-finish operation marketing around 35,000 pigs per year and 1,400 acres of corn and soybeans.

“The operation’s changed a lot in the last couple of generations because when my grandfather was farming (he’s no longer alive now) he had all cattle,” Mike said. “Dad kind of started the pigs when he was younger. When I was a kid, we had cattle and hogs, and then, eventually, we sold the rest of the cows and just stayed with the pigs.”

Fourteen people work on the farm; half of them are family. Members of the Paustian family involved in the operation are Mike’s mom and dad, Kent and Marcia; his uncle, Ross; his cousin, Tom; his wife, Amy; and himself. Mike and Amy’s children will be the seventh generation to work on the Paustian farm if they choose to follow in their family’s footsteps.

“It’s been great to have multiple generations able to work together,” Mike said. “The operation was big enough that it could support everybody. It wasn’t the case of ‘well somebody’s got to leave before someone can come on board.’”

Even though there was room in the operation for Mike and Amy, they spent a few years working elsewhere before returning 15 years ago.

“I really valued my experience with living and working off the farm,” Mike said. “I think that gave me a lot of perspective for coming back. So, I think if any of my kids wanted to farm, I’d encourage them to do the same thing; go work somewhere else first and prove that you can make it on your own and then come back on your own terms.”

A Full Circle System

All of the corn the Paustian family grows goes through their feed mill and gets fed to their pigs. Roughly five and a half million gallons of hog manure is then used to fertilize their crops each year.

For a long time, the family used manure tanks as their method of choice for spreading manure. Their past lineup has included Better-Bilt, Balzer and Houle (GEA) spreaders. The Paustians switched to a dragline system around 15 years ago, something that they didn’t think was an option for them before making the transition.

“We had always thought we didn’t have enough manure volume to justify a dragline system,” Mike said.

After working with Rob Frank, the Paustian’s Stutsman manure equipment salesperson, what felt impractical turned into a reality. Together, they developed a game plan that included a less expensive pump to make the system more justifiable with the amount of manure they spread.

“Going to the dragline really helped eliminate a lot of the compaction issues we were dealing with and that then allowed us to start doing no-till and eventually getting into cover crops as well,” Mike said. “It’s had a big impact on our operation.”

Not only has a dragline system helped with compaction, but it has allowed the Paustians to be much more efficient during the fall manure season.

“It made our lives a lot easier in the fall,” Mike said. “It seemed like we were always finishing applying manure in the middle of a snowstorm because we’d have to start hauling manure as soon as the first field was harvested basically, and we’d be hauling right up until the ground froze almost. With the dragline now, we’re waiting until harvest is completely done.”

With increased efficiency has come the ability to wait for ideal ground temperatures below 50 degrees and their cover crops to be established before manure application.

A Conservation Mindset

Changing how they handled manure paved the way for adjustments in their practices, including implementing no-till and cover crops.

When reflecting on their goals, Mike said they want to “keep doing things every single day that will help us improve or get better” and “be willing to try new things and see if they work better than what we’re doing now. That’s kind of how we ended up where we are with the crop side of things with the no-till and cover crop.”

In addition to planting cover crops, the Paustian family grows their rye seed for the next year’s cover crop by harvesting it over the top of 30 acres of soybeans. After the success they had growing their seed last year, they are making changes to this year’s process to get even better results.

“We’re still kind of tweaking how we do it and trying different things,” Mike said.

Efforts to consistently improve their operation’s sustainability extend beyond no-till and cover crops.

“Anymore, if you’re talking about manure management, I think you need to be thinking about nutrient management too,” Mike said, “and how we make sure those manure nutrients are staying in the field and how we make sure that they’re still there when we have our next crop growing.”

One such nutrient management practice they are trying is saturated buffers, an edge-of-field practice designed to reduce the nitrates reaching a water source.

“Whether it’s building improvements, whether it’s what we’re doing to the ground — preventing soil erosion, keeping nutrients in the field — all those kinds of things from a conservation standpoint to just make the farm better than what it was when we started taking care of it so that future generations will have the opportunity to farm too if they so choose,” Mike said.

Stewards of the Paustian Farming Legacy

Not only are the Paustians working to be stewards of the land, but they also have the responsibility of being stewards of their family’s legacy and ensuring future generations have the same opportunities they did.

“It can be a lot of pressure if you start thinking about the legacy of all the sacrifices that people had to make for me to have the opportunity to be here,” Mike said. “I don’t want to squander that opportunity.”

While the weight of that responsibility is not light, the ability to work with his family toward their goals is something that Mike cherishes.

“The vast majority of people do not get the experience of multiple generations working side by side,” Mike said, “and I think that goes a long way to helping instill work ethic and pride and teamwork within our family.”

The Paustians set a positive example for others in the agriculture industry, but for Mike, setting a good example for his children takes the cake.

“You can tell your kids to work hard and do a good job,” Mike said, “but it’s a whole ‘nother thing when they are actually working with you, and you can show them how to work hard and do a good job.”

When Frederick Paustian settled in Walcott and became a farmer, he probably didn’t know the tradition he was starting in his family. It’s a tradition of doing something every day to be stewards of the family’s operation and land while accomplishing something even greater — a heritage of working hard while taking pride in what they can accomplish together, as a family.