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Boyd Jackson—
Change is future of farming
Boyd and Shanna Jackson, and children Lezlie, Quinn and J.W.
By Mike Barnett
Editor
Change is a familiar word to Boyd Jackson, who farms some 2,200 acres near Lockney.
It's kept this cotton and grain farmer in business for the past 11 years and he expects changing with the times will be the only way he stays in business.
"Several years ago we were putting every input we could into the crop," Boyd says. "We didn't stop and weigh whether that input was paying for itself in the end, whether we really needed to cultivate it four or five times. The money was good so we didn't look as hard at it.
"Now, if the money gets good again, we're really going to be set up for a good business because we're getting so lean in our business practices—just weighing every input to make sure we absolutely have to have it, and that it will pay for itself in the end."
This philosophy has driven Boyd since 1993, when he first started farming. A couple of years later, when his dad was getting ready to retire, Boyd took over one of his places.
Unfortunately, his dad passed away right after that, and Boyd learned a lesson about farming and community—one that has stuck with him ever since.
"My father gave me lots of experience when I was a younger man. After he passed away, the whole community just came together. They all got together and tried to teach me what I needed to know about farming."
Boyd purchased his father's equipment with a 10-year note, straining him financially but saving his mother the "heartache of a farm sale."
"The yearly payments are hard to come up with, but it's nice to have your own equipment," he says.
Today, Boyd farms both irrigated and dryland cotton, milo, seed milo, corn, seed corn, wheat, and runs a few mother cows.
Farming, he says, is a constant challenge with water levels going down and costs going up.
Boyd's improving water use by using LEPA irrigation, which gives him 95 percent water efficiency. He uses fodder to cover his ground on the dryland, to help retain water and keep soil from eroding. Minimum till is one of the changes that keeps him in business.
"We're leaving the stubble from the years past and planting straight in the middle of that," Boyd says. "It's kind of a minimum till, not quite a no-till. We plant maize in the cotton and then turn around and plant cotton back into the maize stubble."
He's also using Roundup technology in his cotton production, giving him a great tool to fight weeds in the minimum till situation, and this year started using Bt technology with some of his cotton to fight insects.
"We've culled down from two full-time hired hands with some part-times to one full-time hired hand with just a very few part-times," he says of his efficiency quest.
Boyd's wife, Shanna, is an integral part of the operation, taking care of all the financials.
"I do all the bookkeeping, pay all the bills, make payroll, keep all of that on the computer. I drive grain trucks if I need to, I can run the module builder, I can help gather and work cows, and I take meals to the field, go get chemicals, go get seed. And I take care of all the kids," she says fondly of their three children.
Although she loves farm life, Shanna wants the children to make their own decisions on their futures. "It would be nice for them to farm, but then I think, `No, I'd really rather you all have doctorates and go off somewhere and see the world.' I want them to go off and experience other things, and then maybe come back here," she says.
As for Boyd, he says he can picture himself doing other things, but not being near as happy.
"A lot of people like to complain about agriculture, but it's been very good to me," he says. "I don't think I'd be in the position I'm in now if it wasn't for agriculture. Ten years from now I would like to be somewhat bigger, but I don't want to farm half the globe. I'd like to keep my freedom where I spend time with my family and friends and help in the community."
Olmpus P1010014
