Jake Fritz: ​when I moved back there was four generations on the place.

Dena Fritz: And four generations trying to make a living off the land. So it was tough.

 

***

Torgerson (narrating): Welcome to Reframing Rural, I'm Megan Torgerson. Today, a conversation with Dena and Jake Fritz, mother and son farmers, ranchers and auction owners from the Montana Hi-Line.

Dena: It's the best thing is to be able to have your family with you. It does make a balancing act because you gotta remember. In this household, it's faith, family, farming. but you gotta remember, family actually does come before the farm. And even though farming is part of your soul, it's just property, not people.
 

Torgerson (narrating): The first time I met Jake and Dena was at the Hi-Line Harvest Festival, an annual celebration in Chester, Montana of the community's agricultural heritage. The area, also known as the Golden Triangle, is Montana's biggest wheat producing region.
 

I had a booth at the festival where I spoke to them. Dena, who's high-spirited and speaks passionately about family agriculture, was not shy about talking into my microphone. Wearing a blue Fritz Inc. baseball cap, dangly earrings and a bright pink shirt, she took a seat next to me to introduce herself.
 

Dena: My name is Dena Fritz and I live just 10 miles northwest of Chester, Montana. My husband was born and raised in Chester. He and his family have been on the ranch. Our grandchildren are the seventh generation. So they have been there since 1909. We're living in that spot, yeah.

Torgerson (narrating): Dena’s son Jake joined me later that afternoon. His red beard was grown out that day, but it was kept neat like the pressed, orange and turquoise Ariat button-up he wore. 
 

Jake: I actually moved back to the house that I grew up in and shared a yard with my parents. I'm now a mile away in a different house. But, uh, yeah, we still farm and ranch together.
We've got our, our separate cows and our separate ground, but pretty well everything's run together. We, we summer separate for the cows and. Seed separate, but when it comes to harvest and calving, everything's together, 
 

Torgerson (narrating): That’s the story we’ll hear today. The story of a generation caught between aging family members who didn’t make a succession plan, and children eager to strategize their transition. 

The Fritzes operate a dynamic, multi-generational business. They raise beef and a variety of crops including wheat, barley, oats, triticale, peas, lentils and mustard. In their spare time, they operate an auction company.

They are proud of their deep agricultural roots in their area and their ability to keep their centennial farm and ranch going. While in the past succession wasn’t a conversation broached by family members, Dena, her husband Jim and their son Jake, have made it a goal to change that. Right now, they’re in the messy middle of succession. It’s a raw and relatable place to be for many families. But it’s a place that’s brimming with lessons.

Dena and Jim live in the Sweetgrass hills, an island range that appears suddenly from the surrounding plains. They look small from afar but they're hardly hills, rising 3,000 to nearly 7,000 feet above the prairie. From the hills, Dena has a view of acres and acres of cultivated crops and in the distance the Bearpaw and even the Rocky Mountains.
 

Dena: Our landscape is, you would say pretty flat because we can see for miles and miles, but when you're actually on the land, there are little dips and groups that you go through. Miles and miles of wheat, barley, mustard, peas. So in spring when everything starts blooming, you get to nice white and yellows with all the green. So it's very pretty, 
 

Torgerson (narrating): Dena raised her two boys, Jake then Jack on fertile cropland and rolling pastures punctuated by eroding rock formations. 
She first interacted with succession in her own family. 
 

Dena: Yeah, so I grew up in Conrad, Montana, so just south. I grew up on a small farm. It was a very small irrigated land. We did hay, wheat, and barley. And I participated in helping. There was two girls. So we did our part.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Dena's identity as a farmer and rancher was born out of her early years working with her dad and grandpa. To Dena, it isn't just the work that she looks back on fondly, it's the people.
 

Dena: We used to say with two peas in a pod, you gotta hang out with your dad and your grandpa and your, I guess that would've been three peas in pod. But so, you all got to hang out and experience it together. No matter if it was, um, your first time trying to drive a swather. Back in the day when it was just touchy everywhere you went, or if it was, the death of a calf you got to experience together. So um, that to me – it's more than just activities of farming and ranching. It's being able to do it with somebody.
 

Torgerson: What happened to your family's farm and, um, were your parents at all like forthcoming with you about succession or how did that play out?
 

Dena: No, there was no succession plan.  So when my grandpa passed away, he did not leave a will. And he had nothing set in stone on how things were gonna happen.
 

Torgerson (narrating): So they formed a corporation and, uh, all of the children were listed equal partners in 50% and then my grandma was the other 50%. Dena’s family operation was splintered into many pieces. The puzzle got even more complicated as family members died and split their portions of the operation.
 

Dena: Um, as people passed, they turned it, their percentages over to their kids usually. Um, the one sister passed it on to all the siblings, so then they added a little bit more.
When my dad passed away, he also did not have a will or any succession plans talked out. So it got divided between my sister and I. And then we tried to buy out the corporation. It did not work. And so we sold shares in it, and since then, it has sold off to miscellaneous buyers.
 

Torgerson: What was your experience like going through that? 
 

Dena: It was uncertain. It was bad. Um, my dad was a really hard worker, but I don't that farming was his first love. He was a very avid hunter. He was a very good electrician, but he continued to farm because that's what his family did.
I mean our heart, my heart’s in agriculture, so I would have gladly continued that.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Dena's dad may have stayed in agriculture because his family expected him to, but unlike her father, Dena has wanted more than anything to be part of a family operation.
 

Dena: I mean, being a farmer/ rancher is, is who you are. I mean, it's not, it's not what you do. You know, it's just like you don't answer like, what's your job? What's your life? What's your this? I mean, it's where my house is, it's where my home is, it's where my family is. It's my job. It's my livelihood. I mean, it's just part of your soul. It becomes part of who you are and that's what you have to do. You have to be all of it to make it
 

Torgerson (narrating): Even though Dena wasn’t able to take over her family’s farm, she got the chance to work on a family place when she married her husband Jim. Jim’s family had been  farming and ranching in the area for many generations, and she jumped right into the operation. She worked hard on the place, even as they raised two kids.
 

Dena: You look at a lot of kids and they don't even know what their parents a living. They’re like, oh, well this is their job. Well, what's that? I don't know. Never seen it done. I have no clue. But I mean  they know exactly what we are doing, the entire time.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Dena made sure her kids were involved in the family operation before they could even walk. It took some ingenuity, but they figured out how to tow their kids along with them to the field and pasture.
 

Dena: We have Jake and Jack and when they were younger, they were part of operation. You know, I remember strapping two car seats on a four wheeler, so we could go move cows. One on the front, one on the back. And of course we were the follower. We were a little slower. Wer weren’t out front running all over, but you're still part of it and they've always been right in the mix of it.

Um, now with the grand boys, it's so fun. They jump in the combine with us and, and ride all day long. And Luke, would be Jake's oldest, he already got the 30-year-old farmer mentality where he's like, okay, it's time to work, it's time to go, it's time to this.

But it's just fun to watch those experiences through their eyes and remember what their dad did when they were that age. And yeah it’s just a great experience. Like I say, it’s just a total way of life that we get to share.
 

Torgerson (narrating): My mom never strapped my car seat to our four wheeler, but I do have fond memories of gripping my big sister’s waist, bandana around my adolescent face to block the dust, as we moved cows home on the four-wheeler in fall. Involving his kids in agriculture, is something that brings Jake a lot of joy too.
 

Jake: Right now my oldest is all about cattle. And my second is all about farming. Not sure where Tate's at yet. He's, he's only 12 months old, he sees a cow out the window and is pounding on the window, mooing at him, so I'm sure he'll be out there pretty quick.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Jake beams behind his beard when he talks about his three boys Luke, Blake and Tate.
Jake and his family live two miles north of the Hi-Line's namesake, US Highway 2, which runs along Burlington Northern's most northerly railroad route. That's where the Fritzes have their calving barns and auction yard. 
At a young age he inherited his mother's love for agriculture. It was a love that was nurtured by both of his parents and his grandpa.
 

Jake: It's been awesome to come back to the family farm and be able to work side by side with Dad every day. Some days are more fun than others and there's always some friction somewhere between family members that are working together. But I, I wouldn't give it up for anything. Being able to work with mom, and dad, and grandpa and Jack from time to time. And he comes out and helps with harvest and branding days and shipping. He still comes out for all of that. It's, it's awesome to do what you love with, with your family.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Jake always wanted to be part of the family operation and came back after a few months at Flathead Valley Community College when the opportunity came up for him to buy his first head of cattle.
 

Jake: Even when I went over to Kalispell to college, I came home every single weekend to work on the place. 
My first semester, a neighbor was looking to get rid of, get outta cows and, uh, lease out the grass. And I jumped on that.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Jake and his high school sweetheart Jimi filled out FSA paperwork the year after Jake graduated from high school to buy 115 cows and move back. He started working on his family's place right away too, making him the youngest of four generations to earn an income from the business.  
 

Jake: Yeah, we moved back. Kind of started our own adventure. I worked with mom and dad and grandpa and I just was a hired hand for the farming side and then we ran cows together separate during the summer, but then together during the, fall and winter time and we calved together.
 

Torgerson (narrating): It was a dream that came true early for Jake to come back to the ranch so soon. But it also made things financially tight. I ask Dena about this time. 
 

Torgerson: What was it like just to have four generations on your place at that time that he moved back?
 

Dena: Yeah, yeah we did have all four generations here when he first moved moved back, and four generations trying to make a living off the same amount of land. So it was a little bit tougher at that point,
Um, at that point when he came back, Jim and I were still, just farming for his dad also. So we didn’t own a lot of land at that point in time either. 
 

Torgerson (narrating): Dena and Jim were running the farm and ranch, but they had to lease the land from Jim’s father and grandmother. 
 

Dena: When Jake first came back, he was just working as a hired hand. Except for the cows that he owned. And then we were still leasing all of the land. And then Errol and then Grandma Lillie, so great Grandma Lillie to Jake, were still getting their piece of the pie also.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Dena and Jim had to give Jake’s great-grandma Lillie and his grandpa Errol 25% of their crop in exchange for the use of their land. 
 

Errol comes up a lot in the Fritzes' conversations about succession. He didn’t prioritize succession planning which is common for his generation. When Errol was in his prime farming and ranching years, succession workshops and documentary podcasts like this one, didn't exist.

Jake describes his grandpa as a rugged, hardened rancher, but it’s clear he loves him. He remembers a story from when his grandpa was younger.
 

Jake: So as long as I can remember, uh, he'd lived up in the hills. And when I was growing I’d spend weekends up there with him every once in a while. And, we commonly refer to that site as the hell hole. And, I was up there, calvin with him one time, I was pretty young, elementary school aged, and, uh, blizzard rolled in and I, I vividly remember going out in a pickup and just grabbing calves out of snow banks to take back to the barn. And why he calved up there in February and March, I have no idea. I would never do that again. But, uh, he did it for a lot of years.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Jake paints a picture of his grandpa as a strong-willed and admirable rancher, but what I hear from Dena is that Errol also put his business interests first without much consideration for the younger generation. For example, the land Dena and Jim lease from Errol, they have an agreement where they front all the input costs. 
 

Dena: And then we give a quarter of the crop to the actual land owner. So it's like you’re putting in all the inputs and the hours and everything, but it's getting shared with four generations. So it was tough.
 

Torgerson (narrating): The terms of crop share agreements like this vary between landowners and farmers. But it’s common, especially among family members, that a landowner would contribute to the cost to produce the crop, in addition to receiving a portion of the profits. So a lot of financial burden fell on Dena and Jim. 
 

Dena: So we're buying the seed, buying the equipment, planting the seed, putting all the fertilizer, chemicals, whatever used to be done to raise that seed, and to haul the seed, and then we provide all of the labor.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Dena, Jim and Jake were contributing all the labor, but they had to split the profits with Errol and his mom Lillie. To further complicate things, the two senior generations didn't have a succession plan.
More about their failure to plan, after this short break.
 

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 This season of Reframing Rural is produced in collaboration with Winnett ACES which stands for Agricultural Community Enhancement and Sustainability. The mission of the Winnett ACES is to strengthen their community by enhancing the health of their land, economy, and traditions for future generations. 

Season Four: Succession Stories is supported by the Plank Stewardship Initiative, World Wildlife Fund, Headwaters Foundation, and American Farmland Trust.
 

***
 

Torgerson (narrating): Welcome back to Reframing Rural, I'm Megan Torgerson. We just learned that Dena’s father-in-law Errol and his mom, Lillie didn't make a succession plan. And that became a problem when Lillie died in 2016. After she passed, Dena and her husband Jim learned what would happen to Lillie’s land.
 

Dena: There really wasn't. There wasn't a succession plan there. 
 

Torgerson (narrating): Because Lillie didn’t have a succession plan, half of her land went to her son Errol and the other half went to her daughter. This was land Dena and Jim had already been farming and so counted on for their income. To hold onto this land, they had to buy out Errol’s sister’s half and then they leased from Errol the land he’d just inherited from his mom. 
 

Every time land is passed down without a plan like this, it risks leaving the family. 
The Fritzes are deeply aware of what happens to farms that fail to transition to the next generation. That’s because they own the Fritz Auction company, where they facilitate the sale of farm equipment. That equipment often comes from a farm that shuts down when a family sells its land. 
 

Dena: The auction company is sometimes bittersweet, because a lot of times you're walking into, you know, a failed operation. Sometimes you're, you're walking into where the main farmer is retiring and none of his family wants to come back. And then there's other times where they've passed away and there's no one to take over, and they didn't do their succession plan. There's nothing. They just got to sell it all to try and pay for everything else that's going on. So it's been interesting to visit with them. I mean, you're wearing kid gloves because you're trying to handle the auction business, but you don't want to forget about their feelings. 
 

Torgerson (narrating): I imagine owning an auction company could be a little like owning a funeral home. Sometimes you’re caring for the feelings of loved ones left behind to auction off their parent or grandparent’s possessions. Other times the farmer is still living, but auctioning off their equipment may feel to them like the death of their operation, or at least their time running the place. As many of the farmers and ranchers selling through the Fritzes don't have anyone in the family who wants to come home and take over, that adds another degree of emotional hardship to these sales. 
Grandpa Errol started the auction company in 1969 after he went to auctioneering school in Missouri. To be successful, I’m sure he showed a degree of sensitivity and empathy during his time running the business. And it was something he wanted his family to be able to continue after him, as when Jake was little, his grandpa passed down the rhythmic art of auctioneering to him.
 

Jake: When I was a kid, grandpa used to have me count in fives. Go 5-5-, 10-10, 15-15, 20-20, 25-25, 30-30, 35-35, 40-40, 45-45, 50-50, 55-55, 60-60, just go all the way up and just keep doing it. 

 

Torgerson (narrating): Curious to hear Jake show off his auctioneering voice, we make up a used piece of equipment for him to sell.
 

Torgerson: Could you auction some old piece of equipment you could conjure from your mind.
 

Jake: We’ve got a 9,600 John Deere here. Who'll, gimme $25,000. Then now 25, 25, 30, 30, 35. 35, 35, 35. 35, 35, 40, 40, 45. Hit 45. Then now 45. 45 50. 50 50. Sold for 45,000.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Dena and Jim bought the auction company from Errol a decade ago and a few years ago Jake bought into the company too.

To save the Fritz farm and ranch from the auction block, Dena and Jim have taken opportunities like buying the land from Lillie’s daughter and buying the auction company from Errol.

Dena, who experienced the loss of her childhood farm, says the extra expenses are worth it to set the next generation up for success.
 

Dena: Yeah, so there’s a lot of extra inputs that my generation is trying to do, you know, but that makes it a little harder to get by. A little more expensive. So our hope is to be able to eat those expenses in this generation to help the next generation.

So Jake sees that, Jake sees how our transition was, did not like it expressed early how he didn't like it. I was in total agreement with him , and I said, no, it won’t happen that way. We won't step back and you know, take all the profit but and only pay you a hired man wage. I said, that's not, we're not interested in that.

We're interested I the helping the next generation. Because I mean, you barely make it year to year. If you are, if you're putting all the inputs in and all the labor in and not getting a full share back, it makes it tough.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Dena is very aware that it’s becoming more and more challenging to make it in the industry that she loves so intensely. So she’s doing what she can to give her kids a leg up.

When Jake first came back to his family’s farm and ranch, he recognized that he also needed to do all he could to make it in ag. He couldn't rely solely on the wages he was earning working for his parents and Grandpa Errol, so he sought out more opportunities.

Most kids coming back to their family farms have to supplement their income one way or another as they build up their own business. My dad did the same thing when he moved back to Northeast Montana. As he worked to buy land and a herd of his own, he labored as a hired hand for his dad and uncles, was a rural mail carrier, school bus driver and started a business checking oil holding tanks.

While Jake’s supplemental income were the cows he bought right after high school, he still spent a lot of time working with his parents and grandpa. I ask Jake what it was like working across generations, and he shares a story about teaching his grandpa Errol how to use new technology in his combine.
 

Jake: Grandpa bought a new combine. And , it was the first one with auto steer that we had, and it was a color monitor instead of the black and white monitor. And we had many discussions on what to touch and what not to touch. Because I understood the monitor and he didn't. 

I ran late one night and, uh, so I was sleeping in the next morning and seven o'clock I get a phone call. This monitor's broken. I'm throwing it underneath the combine tire. I said, please don't do that. I will be out there in a minute. 
 

Torgerson (narrating): Jake’s grandpa had made a mistake trying to operate the tractor’s GPS.
 

Jake: So I got it set back up and, said a few choice words, I think, and walked back to the house to go take a nap. And looking back at it, I actually made a piece of paper, a manual for him, a paper manual on how to operate that. And mean, hindsight's always better than the present, but taking time to understand what that generation gone through and what that, the advances late in that generation was one of the toughest things for me to help with. Because, I mean, we're the, we're the generation of technology. My kids are better at technology than I am, and I was, I thought pretty good. I designed websites and, made all kinds of stuff and I coded, but they had, they had nothing before that. And so trying to teach them from what they know and having understanding doing it.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Jake's compassion and patience with his grandpa was an asset when he moved back home. While his technology skills proved useful as equipment continued advancing, it was hard for Jake at first to assert his ideas.
Back with Dena, I ask more about Jake's transition back to the farm and ranch.
 

Dena: It was a difficult position to be in for a young man coming back, you know, he didn't get as much say as probably he would like at that point in time, but we did take his advice, under consideration. 

But at that time, he was still just working for us and we were still kind of working for Errol. So, I mean, we were working down, down the way. And so it made it tough, um, to incorporate new new ideas.
 

Um, so it was kind of a funny transition. By the time we were actually buying into land. We were still making most of the decisions as the leasee. But um, by the time we were actually buying into it, Jake was also given the opportunity to lease a cousin's place, which just connects us all back together to what the original host done. 

So he became his own boss really fast. And then still working together with us. So we kind of all work together. Um, but we all have our say on our own land.
 

Torgerson (narrating): The farmland Jake started leasing from his relative is part of the original Fritz family homestead from back in 1909. That original family land had been split up in succession decisions in the past. When the family member who owned the land got injured, he reached out to Jake. 
 

Jake: he actually fell off of a ladder and spent 77 days in the hospital. And, coming out of that, he came and talked to me and said that he didn't, uh, wanna be crippled up the rest of his life and didn't, wanna keep doing it, and wanted to give me a chance at it.
 

Torgerson (narrating): This chance to lease the original homestead from Jake's relative, enabled him to put back together land that hadn't been unified in 60 years.
 

Jake: So, I've added some stuff on top of that and. Yeah, brought it all back together.
 

Torgerson (narrating): It's rare to piece back together an original homestead. It's something my dad would have liked to see in our family. My grandpa and his brothers used to farm our homestead together under the name Torgerson Brothers. The Torgerson brothers had their own families then eventually split the land. It was first divided amongst the brothers, and when they passed away, the land was passed down to their kids which included my dad, his brother and cousins. One of his cousins sold land outside of the family which caused rifts that are still felt today.

It's symbolic for Jake and his dad Jim to have the opportunity to farm their original family homestead. It’s the land the Fritzes made home when they ventured from Germany to the U.S. 115 years ago. It’s also easier logistically to have farmland that's closer together.

​

While Jake, and Dena and Jim have their own leased and deeded land - and their own equipment - when it comes time to seed, spray and harvest parcels like the Fritz homestead, they work together. It takes effort to coordinate whose land will get seeded or harvested first, but they take the time to make these plans before getting into the field.

Planning conversations like this have become more important as the two generations have independently bought more land. Owning their own ground separate from Grandpa Errol's has enabled them to keep all their profits and own all decision making.

Grandpa Errol who's now 84, recently retired to Great Falls and has taken a back seat on managing the operation. Jake says he’s happy for his grandpa.
 

Jake: He was pretty tough. He worked hard his life and he's deserved a little time off.
 

Torgerson (narrating): The way Errol has handled business arrangements between the generations has been hard on Jake and especially his parents, but Jake doesn't blame his grandpa.
 

Jake: If you're gonna have a generational farm or ranch, and if you could make it picture perfect, you'd, you'd have generation one owning everything. Generation two operating and generation three working for generation two. But doesn't always work that way. And when you have, when the upper generation has a lot of their assets tied up into the land or equipment or it's, it's tough to be able to retire comfortably without having to sell something off to make it work too. 
 

Torgerson (narrating):  The fewer number of times that a family has to buy something is typically better.
Retiring for a farmer is different from the average American. You don’t get a pension, or an employer-funded 401k. Just last year, Errol needed money for his retirement. With short notice, he told Jim and Dena he wanted to sell them some of his land.
 

Dena: Well, and that was kind of a lack of planning too, because it just happened like really fast. So that was a big chunk of expense that we weren't expecting last year that just all of a sudden was there. And so now trying to budget this year with that big amount of money missing from the account, yeah. 

So the saying around here this year, I keep telling Jim, slow your roll. It's like anytime he starts looking at a piece of equipment, I'm like, slow your roll.
 

Torgerson (narrating): While Dena wasn't pleased with her father-in-law's lack of proactive communication, she respects that he has the right to do what he wants with the land.
 

Dena: So like, right now, I look and I say, well, it's Errol's. It's up to if Errol decides this, that's what he decides it's his. I mean, I may not agree with his decision. I you know, I might not understand his decision, but it's his decision to be made. And so I hope that the boys, even though we have them very involved in our decisions. At the end, I hope they say, hey, that was mom and dad's. That was their land. That was their decision. I may not understand it, may not agree with it, but it was theirs.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Over the generations the Fritz family has farmed and ranched in the region, the family has seen lots of changes in the industry, and in the makeup of landowners in their region. 
 

Torgerson: When land in the area, doesn't stay in the family, what often happens to it?
 

Dena: Well, the majority of it in this area is bought by local Hutterite colonies. We just as individual farmers, you can't compete with a colony that's got backing, you know, they've got, there's a whole lot of colonies together that that can pool money and make that work for them. Where we can't, you know, we can't compete with those prices. You can't pencil it. You can't pay that much and make it work.
 

Torgerson (narrating): A few folks we spoke with for this series mentioned that they’ve seen lots of land sold to Hutterite farmers and ranchers in recent years. Sometimes confused with Amish or Mennonites, Hutterites are a group of Anabaptist Christians whose roots stem from the Radical Reformation of the 16th century. Hutterites are communal and agrarian. Their property and possessions are shared among the whole colony. They have a large agricultural presence in Montana's Golden Triangle region, along with our neighbors to the north, Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan. According to a 2019 study from the University of Montana and Montana State University, Montana has 53 Hutterite colonies and more than 5,000 members in the state. They produce 95% of the state’s eggs and 90% of its hogs. 

There's concern among some family farmers and ranchers that Hutterite colonies are at an unfair advantage when it comes to buying farm land. Because the colony pools resources, they are able to pay above market rates for land, pushing some family operators out of the competition.
Jake says this is happening in their area.
 

Jake: We've got three colonies fairly close to us. So we've got Eagle Creek, Sage Creek, and Highline. Highline just picked up another farm, uh, a couple months ago and so, I mean, they're still actively out there buying, 
 

Torgerson (narrating): While some farmers are frustrated that Hutterite colonies beat their offers for land, , Dena says she’s friendly with Hutterite people who live in her area. 
 

Dena: Our neighbors are Hutterites, and they are fantastic. They are the best neighbors. They if there's a fire, they're the first ones there to help fight it a flat tire. They're there to help us. You know, if we need something machined quick, they'll help us with that. So we have been very lucky.
 

Torgerson (narrating): The Fritzes were also lucky when a neighbor who decided to sell, chose to sell to farmers outside the colonies.
 

Dena: I can’t even remember what year it was, but a piece of land that's literally across the road for me, I mean, I'm looking out the window, and it's right there for sale, and we were just blessed that that neighbor was willing to divide the acres so each neighbor could buy a piece of it, and not at quite the price as what was offered by the colony. 
 

Torgerson (narrating): The Fritzes have been fortunate to have the opportunity to farm neighboring properties like the one their neighbor sold to them, and the farmland a relative leased to them that was part of their original homestead. As they have expanded and Grandpa Errol aged out of farming and ranching, they found that they needed more help.
This year, they hired employees through  the H2A visa program to support their businesses. H2A workers come from other countries to fill a growing need for farmers and ranchers across the U.S.: labor. 
Jake shares that anymore it's hard to find local hired hands.
 

Jake: Not only are the, the farms getting bigger and bigger and there's less number of farms, also the hired hands aren't families anymore. And I’m not really sure what the real connection of it is, but there used to be a lot of hard hand families around and there's not anymore.
 

Torgerson (narrating): With a shortage of agricultural workers in the U.S., the H2A program has provided critical support so families can stay in agriculture and successfully transition their operations to the next generation.
 

Pine Kleinhaus: I am from South Africa, and um, I work in America, uh, since 2002 was my first visit.
 

Torgerson (narrating): This is Pine Kleinhaus, a Fritz employee who first came to America to work in the early 2000s, but who's been with the Fritzes for the last three years. The Fritzes have a few employees from South Africa.  
After my dad retired, my cousin hired two farmworkers from South Africa to help work the land he’s leasing from my dad. When I was at the Hi-Line Harvest Festival in Chester, I met a lot of people from South Africa who were working on farms in the area. It’s not a coincidence that people from the other side of the world end up working on farms in Montana. South Africa has a diversified agricultural sector that includes grains, oil seeds and livestock like what is grown in the Golden Triangle, so many South African farmers have skills that make them very useful on Montana farms and ranches. 
Pine works for the Fritzes from January to October. Reframing Rural producer, Madeline Jorden, spoke with Pine during his last month with the Fritzes.
 

Madeline Jorden: Do you find it hard to be like away from your family and, and your home for that long? 
 

Kleinhaus: Oh, yeah. It's tough. It's tough. I mean, it, I, we came over for, what, nine months? 10 months? It's, it's, it's quite, it's, it's long. I mean, it's, it's fine six months of the year, but it's, it starts when it gets that long, I mean.
Um, we, we, we count, we count the, the, the, the, not the days anymore. We count the hours.
 

Torgerson (narrating): What makes it worth it for Pine to spend a majority of the year working halfway around the world, is that he can make almost twice as much working in the U.S. than he can in his home country.
 

Kleinhaus: But yeah, after you have, after you pay all your bills, it's, it's kinda you, you got nothing left. I mean, you, you just, just survive.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Pine is 56 years old and plans to work in the U.S. for a few more years before moving back to South Africa to work on a farm there. For now, he lives most of the year away from his family.
Finding reliable and capable employees like Pine, was a game changer for the Fritzes. I ask Dena how they first started using the H2A Visa program and she tells me they tried hiring local but that it didn't work out.
 

Dena: So four years ago, we had a hired hand, a full-time hired hand at that time. And it was during harvest, and he gave his two week notice. And so, yeah, so with harvest, it's like an all hands on deck kind of thing. And so Jake applied for an emergency H2A so that they could get over here faster. And so that's when our first H2A came, and so he was only here for a few months. So then we decided that we would look more into the program. 
Before we did that, we tried hiring a local kid who unfortunately did not work out. He didn't know what a grease cert was. I mean, he didn't know basics of agriculture or mechanics or anything. So that one didn't work out. We tried another hired hand that was kind of down on his luck and needed something. And so we're like, well, we have a house. We have this. We'll, you know, let's see what happens. It did not work out at all. He just didn't have the skill set or the desire, you know, for farming. So we're like, wow, let's look back into this H2A  program.
 

Torgerson (narrating): This year the Fritzes have four employees from abroad to help with the work load. It's helped make things more manageable for Jake, Jim and Dena, and it’s given them more time to spend as a family. 
 

Dena: With having the H2As, it gives us more personal time to spend with family without being in the field. You know, we're spending time doing different things, and I know, like Jake and Jimmy have been able to take the boys across the mountains a lot, to a family place over there, and things like that, where we never did that. I mean, if we got ran down to the lake, which is like 20 miles away, we did great. 
 

Torgerson (narrating): I think that getting this family time in is crucial for the long-term success of a farm or ranch. According to a study from the Western Regional Agricultural Stress Assistance Program, the top three stressors producers experience are financial worries, production costs and a lack of time. 

One can only assume that if a farmer or rancher is worried about not having enough time to get their work done, they're not having enough time to spend with their family. Having help doesn't mean these producers aren't busy. Though Dena is starting to slow down, she's still doing a lot on the farm and ranch. 
 

Dena: The only thing I don't do, I do not run the sprayer. I don't mess with any of the chemical, mixing the chemicals. And Jim loves being in that sprayer. He says it's like a day off. So he just so he runs that so anything else I can pretty much jump on any piece of equipment and take off with it. This year for calving, I just did one night check a week, just gave everybody else a break and stayed at the barn during the night. So that's been a slow down for me since the H2As came, because I used to be the night check person, but now, now that they're here, I only do one night a week, which is crazy amazing. Yeah, and then, and then I do all of our book work.
 

Torgerson (narrating): With a little more time freed up, Dena and her husband Jim are to the point now where they have the time and space to think about their succession plan. More about that after this short break.
 

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Do you have a farm or ranch succession story you'd like to share with us? Call (406) 219-7465‬ and leave a voicemail to share either your family's experience with succession or reflections you have on the stories you’ve heard this season.
 

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Torgerson (narrating): Dena and Jim both came from generations who did not prioritize succession planning. Dena lived through the heartache of losing her family's farm, and they both lived through the tension of working under Jim's dad Errol for too long. Still to this day, they live with the uncertainty of what will happen to Errol's land after he passes. Having experienced this, I ask what their plans are for the future and when they started to make a plan.
 

Torgerson: I'm curious if you remember the moment that you started to kind of think about the future of your family's farm and ranch.
 

Dena: Um, that would probably be the day we got married and then the day the kids were born. Yes no, it's constantly in your mind. I mean, when we're gone, there's only another generation who knows who we were, and so, so it's just, you've got to realize that you aren't here forever. So what are you going to do with this land? And so to me, I look at it and I want it to stay in the family. That's the dream. Is it the possibility? I hope so. But you just never know with the economy, the way it is, with the rules, how they change all the time. It's it makes it difficult to give a farm. 

Where, back in the day, you know, those first four generations, five generations, just handed down the land. I mean, it just simply handed down to the next generation, yeah, and then this generation that I'm in right now, it didn't get just handed down. Part of it's been handed down, but part of it had to be purchased, you know? And so hopefully the next generation will be able just to hand it down again and try and do it in such a way that makes them successful.
 

Torgerson (narrating): I think this is the reason succession is such a widely-covered topic in agriculture today. It’s not only because the majority of landowners are Baby Boomers who are aging out of the work. 

It’s important because it’s becoming harder to make a living in agriculture. 

For the success of the industry, and the nation’s food security, we need the people who are in ag, to remain in the industry. We also need new people to enter the industry, but that’s hard to do in production agriculture where the price of land and equipment are often barriers to entry. That places a lot of pressure on young producers like Jake who are born into agriculture. So it’s important that senior generations look out for the farmers and ranchers rising through the ranks. They are our future.
 

Torgerson: Do you think, um, that you're looking out for the success of Jake's generation maybe more than the generation before you?
 

Dena: Yes. Yep, it's pure and simple. Yeah, just I read something or saw something one day, and it was talking about we got to quit farming in the past, and we got to farm to the future. And it wasn't talking about technology and growth patterns and everything else it was talking about, you truly wanting to farm. 

Are you only farming like my dad did, because that's what he was expected, and that's what life told him he was going to do, or are you farming to the future where you're going to make it better for the next generation? Because it is. It's a tough industry, and it's not gotten any easier.

You know, a combine now is a million dollars.
 

Torgerson: Yeah. That's insane.
 

Dena: A million dollars for something you use two months out of the year. You know, it's crazy the increase, and granted, there's a whole lot of new technology. They're bigger machines. You can get that stuff done faster than what you used to be able to do, but you're still getting the same bushels off of it. You know, you're not this huge increase in bushels compared to what you used to get either.
 

Torgerson: Then you just have to cover more and more ground and like I feel like, I think about like my dad, I just saw less and less of him as the years progressed and as the youngest in my family, like I, because then he was expanding more than when my sisters were growing up and they didn't have as much money, but they like saw my dad a lot more. You know?
 

Dena: Yeah.
 

Torgerson: that takes a toll on, on families and like on schools, because then you have less families who are around. You don't need as many people to farm, so, yeah.
 

Dena: Yeah. And the big machinery, I mean, it helps you get over the acres a lot faster, but you need more acres to get over to pay for that big machinery. So, I don't know that you're winning. I really don't.
 

Torgerson (narrating): It's a tricky balance. At first, Dena and Jim needed to buy more land so they could produce more and cover their expenses. With the price of grain the same as it was 30 or 40 years ago, this is the rat race that production agriculture enters people into today. It forces them to buy more land and get bigger equipment, but it’s not always clear when you should stop expanding. 

Jim and Dena feel like they are at that point. They have enough land to cover their annual input costs, including hired help. 
But while Dena and Jim want to start slowing down, Jake is younger and is at a point in his life when he wants to keep growing his assets.
 

Jake: I'd still kind of like to grow a little bit and, uh, I think dad thinks we're too big already, but keeping it going and vision for the, the type of quality I believe is the same, I think the quantity maybe differs a little bit.
 

Torgerson (narrating): The way Dena sees it, continuing to expand also takes time away from your family. That's not something she wants for herself as her grandkids are growing up and she's planning for retirement.
Dena and her husband are in their 50s, so they're at an earlier stage in the transition process than the other families we've heard from this season. I ask Dena what conversations they've had so far with Jake and Jack about their succession plans.
 

Dena: I always joke. I said, if Jim and I died today, it would be taken care of, because we have our will in order from here to there, which I hope is quite a few more years, we got to try and figure things out. And so right now, we always talk about slowing down. We don't want to stop, but we do want to slow down and just not be on all the time. You know, be able to take some time off. And we, the last couple years, we actually have increased the amount of time that we run away for on a vacation or go do something, so we've been able to do that. And we're able to do that because Jake takes on more responsibility, and we also have the H2Asso that has helped immensely. 
 

Torgerson (narrating): Dena and Jim have made a will, but are still ironing out the details of their succession plan. As part of their unfolding plan, they created a corporation.
 

Dena: Um, as far as succession planning itself, we do have all of our equipment in a corporation. Jake and Jack are current officers, but they're non stock holding members corporation. So as we start to slow down there, we will be able to gift them stock. So then as the years go by, they will own more and more of the corporation, and then hopefully, by the time we're done, they will already own the corporation. They'll own the equipment.
 

Torgerson (narrating): As far as the land goes, Dena and Jim own that personally and plan to lease to Jake and his brother Jack if he decides he wants to come back and farm someday.
 

Dena: So what we'll probably end up doing. And what we've discussed doing is, when we decide to slow down a lot more, we'll start leasing the land to Jake and then and possibly Jack, if he decides he wants to come back also. So we've been visiting with both of the boys, so they both have the option to lease and to start taking care of, you know, of the land themselves, same with the cattle, we would be able to, maybe, we'll sell the cows to them and still own the pasture land, and so then we would make a little income that way. 

You know, it's so hard to balance that you still have an income while you're still here, to be able to still pay for all the things you're doing. Because, you know, we're going to, we're going to be paying on ranch land and farm land and everything and equipment for a lot more years. I mean, we still have years of payments on things that we're working on now, and so we can't just turn it over. 
 

Torgerson (narrating):  Dena and Jim don't want to ask their kids to buy their land, like Errol did. They're hoping to will the land to the next generation after they're gone. I ask how they think they'll do that at this point in time and Dena mentions the saying from succession workshops many producers recited this season.
 

Dena: There was a succession workshop and everyone that I've ever talked to that went to that workshop remembers the one line that said, equal isn’t fair and fair isn't equal.

Yeah. They all remember that line. And it works for our generation too, because my husband is one of four, and he is the only one who stayed on the farm. So you're hoping that blood and sweat equity, you know, is is part of the decision making, and it definitely is for us.
 

Torgerson (narrating): What Dena is implying here is that when Errol passes, they hope that Jim will inherit more than his siblings who didn't put their life blood into the farm and ranch. Jake shares what could happen if Errol doesn't factor in his dad’s sweat equity.
 

Jake: Dad has three other siblings. And so depending on how it's split, which we don't really know yet much of anything. And uh, I mean trying to judge off of that, if, if it was split evenly, I could be looking at an eighth of that ground that I'm currently, I. I'm working on right now and pretty tough to make it on an eighth share.

Torgerson (narrating): "Equal isn't fair, and fair isn't equal." Who knows if that's on Grandpa Errol's mind, but it's something Jim and Dena are considering for when the time comes to transition the farm and ranch to Jake and his younger brother Jack. Jack took a job with the railroad after high school, and he’s decided to stick with that more structured career path. But Dena wants to keep open communication between the generations.
 

Dena: So he's, he's always got the option to come back if he wants to. And Jake is very open to that, which is wonderful and, and we always have a conversation about it. It's not a, hey, I'm gonna bring jack back, and you have no say. You know that type of thing. We’ve been very open. 
 

Torgerson (narrating): Jake echoes his mom's sentiments that Jack is welcome back, but he recognizes the benefits of working for a big company. 
 

Jake: He's got enough years in to be in now, I'd be pretty silly to, I. that away until he gets full retirement. So I understand why he's staying there, but there's always a spot here if he needs it.
 

Torgerson (narrating): For now, Jake is the one taking over the family place. I ask Dena what she hopes for Jake during this transition.
 

Torgerson: What hopes do you have for, for Jake and his family? I guess just seeing that he's kind of the likely one to take over.
 

Dena: You know, you would think, you know, you think success. But to me, it's more satisfaction. Are you satisfied with this lifestyle? Are you satisfied with your family? Are you satisfied with the combination of all of it going together? Success is different for everybody. You know, if, like I said earlier, if I can pay my bills and have a little extra that’s success for me. You know, other people need to have a whole lot of money in the bank, a whole lot of you know that type of thing to be successful. But I think if you're satisfied with where you are, like for me, I don't feel we need to grow bigger than what we already are to be satisfied with what we have. Now, I think it's like a lot of gratitude to you know, you've got to be happy for what you have. The good Lord only gives you what you can handle type of thing, and so maybe sometimes bigger is more than you can handle. Yeah, so, but that's what I hope for them. I just hope that they are satisfied with the life they've led.
 

Torgerson (narrating): Back with Jake, I ask what it means to him to be carrying the torch as the sixth generation of Fritzes to make a living on this patch of Earth.
 

Torgerson: What does it mean to you to be the one continuing your family's, um, farm and ranch legacy?
 

Jake: Oh, good. But there's a lot of pressure with it. It's, uh, you think about all the generations before that have compiled this land down to, to where I'm working it now, and it's, it's a lot of pressure.
 

Torgerson: How do you handle that pressure, I guess, what do you do with that feeling?
 

Jake: Oh, just push it deep down. no, I talked to my wife about it. If it wasn't for Jimi, I wouldn't be doing much of this stuff. She's helped me out a lot. Been married for eight years now, three children together. Hopefully can continue it on with them. 
 

Torgerson (narrating): We've been reflecting this season on how being the generation to take over the ranch is the gift and responsibility of a lifetime, but as Jake names, it also comes with an unspeakable amount of pressure. With every generation there's the fear that in the liminal space of a transition, the farm and ranch could slip away. That the generations of love and labor that result in a farm and ranch, could be lost to another.

If Dena and Jake have anything to do about it, that won't happen. In closing, I ask Dena what she wants to be known for, generations down the line.
 

Dena: I guess I would like them to know that we, as a couple, cared for this land, and we did the best we could to make it better for the next generation. Because, I mean, if, if people aren't given this easier route to agriculture, it's hard, it's a hard job. It's got to be part of your soul or you can't do it. But if they're not helped along the way, they are not it's not going to be sustainable for them. And if, if we run out of farms, I mean, What are y'all going to wear? What are you going to live in? What are you going to eat? Everyone is connected to agriculture, even when they don't think about it.
 

Torgerson (narrating): We’re all connected to the land, some are just a few generations removed. 

Succession keeps that connection. It holds together the sinews of time and toil and sustenance. 

Succession isn’t just a family retreat with a facilitator, a giant book of procedures, the reading of a will or the distribution of assets. It is a constant, churning process, woven through every decision on a farm and ranch. Every interaction between family members. Even every piece of food we buy at the store. 

Succession means life, for all of us. But for families in agriculture, it’s a baton passed down from ancestors made of dreams and best intentions. It’s a wish to keep going, if not forever, then at least for a little while.
 

This episode of Reframing Rural was written, reported and produced by me, Megan Torgerson with help from our story editor, Mary Auld, and associate producer Madeline Jorden. Music and audio engineering was by Aaron Spieldenner and Sean Dwyer of Hazy Bay Music with additional music by Skyler Mehal and Chandra Johnson. This season of Reframing Rural is made in collaboration with Winnett ACES, with funding and support from the Plank Stewardship Initiative, World Wildlife Fund, Headwaters Foundation, American Farmland Trust, the Department of Public Transformation and listeners like you. If you know someone who is going through succession planning or who loves a good family agriculture story, please share today’s story with them. To find out more about season four of Reframing Rural, Succession Stories, and past seasons, visit reframingrural.org.