This week on the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we're talking to Asia Kalcevic, a fifth-generation farmer at Kalcevic Farms in Bennett, Colorado.
Kalcevic joined her family's grain operation after studying communications and ag literacy at Colorado State University. Since then, she's grown into her role as the administrator and operations associate on the farm, where she's responsible for a variety of tasks from data entry to running the farm's social media and marketing.
But all that hasn't kept her out of the fields. Kalcevic has also been a grain cart operator during the wheat harvest for the past seven years.
"That's what we're planning for the whole year. Those moments when we're running 17 to 20 hour days in the field," Kalcevic said of her farm's harvest. "But you sit in your cab and you listen to some music and you go after it."
Kalcevic Farms has been in operation since 1898.
Being part of a business rooted in her family's history has given Kalcevic an appreciation for the generations of farmers who came before her — some of whom she's been able to work with.
"It's something to not take for granted and to take the opportunity to learn from the past generation that was farming in the 1950s and was born in the 1930s during the Dust Bowl," she said. "I love to see the difference between what they were doing then and what we're doing now."
One of the biggest differences is the approach to equipment maintenance.
"Back in their day, they if they didn't have it, they built it. And now it's like, if we don't have it, we run to the park store or we buy it," she said, also noting that today's air-conditioned cabs and air ride seats seem like luxuries compared to the pared down seats and umbrellas earlier generations employed.
Working with multiple generations on the farm means succession and transition are ongoing conversations critical to the operation's success.
Kalcevic said they're very intentional about creating pathways within their operation to leadership and ownership. If an employee — family member or not — is interested, there's a way forward.
"It's really been something that I've looked forward to growing up, that I have an opportunity to have a seat at the table," she said.
You can read the articles mentioned in the episode here:
Great Gift Ideas for Farmers (From Farmers!)
6 Gardening Gifts That'll Please Even the Pickiest Gardeners on Your List
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