Arkansas Neighbors

"Dunlap’s Spring Breeze” sounds like the name of a sweet-smelling air freshener or maybe the newest brand of antibacterial hand soap. But in reality it’s the registered name of Paul and Teresa Schot’s milk cow. No wonder they call her “Daisy.”

Clint Brown lives on and owns 80 acres in West Fork, Ark., but works as a hired hand for the Willow Springs Ranch owned by Larry Walker in Prairie Grove, Ark. Clint was raised both in Devils Den and the Strickler part of West Fork. JR, Clint's father, believed that a man had to have many skills in order to support himself. Clint took his father's advice and became skilled in many areas.

There’s more than one way to make a profit in the beef industry, and the Church family of Viola, Ark., has found a way to do it. Since the 1980s, Jay and his wife, Georgie, have raised Corriente cattle as sport cattle for rodeo events such as team roping and bulldogging. After a year in the arena, the cattle would be returned to them and the Churches would take them to the sale barn. It didn’t take long to discover that lean cattle with long horns aren’t top sellers there.

Through a thick, deep pasture in a valley on the Chevallier farm grazes a gentle, peaceful herd of Katahdin sheep. Dr. Beverly Chevallier, who practices at her veterinary clinic in Western Grove, Ark., is focused on growing quality sheep for the meat market. She implements grazing and managing techniques, and couples a beef herd as well, to meet her production goals.

Jack and Kay Carmody live in a beautiful and privately located area where their ranch spreads out over 100 acres of spring green pastures and wooded areas near Hartman, Ark. Their home is over 140 years old. “It used to be an old nunnery and when our house burnt, I moved this building out here and made it our new house,” said Jack. “It took a lot of work because I also worked a full time job and broke horses too.”

There are as many ways to run a successful cattle operation as there are people. Eddie and Teresa McCoin of Afton, Okla., are among the more unusual because they run an operation based on cattle trading.

Father and son, Mac and Wade Hampton, of Westville, Okla., have been working together since Wade's early childhood. Wade remembers driving a '47 blue Chevy truck when he was 4 years old and barely able to see through the steering wheel while his dad was cutting and unloading square bales for cattle. Wade said, "My dad always told me that if it looked like I was going to hit a tree or something, just turn off the key. The problem was one day I was distracted by some nuts and bolts in the glove box and my dad had to hit on the cab of the truck to get my attention. I turned off the key and luckily stopped just in time."

Zack Brown, of Lowell, Ark., decided to bring back the convenience of the milkman when thinking about how to serve the global food movement of people wanting traceable food. He decided he needed to look for an unadulterated product that wasn’t warehoused or transported to reduce cost and get a better product to the customer. He had to go to the farmer. “Farm Box Delivers is trying to get back to our roots and the way we used to buy food,” Zack said. “Consumers need to start taking responsibility for how they buy food and farmers need to take responsibility for how they sell food. There has to be a communal responsibility about how we source food, buy food and sell food.”

As every producer in agriculture knows, starting a new farm is an expensive and complex process. Pauline Thiessen seems up to the challenge. She has worked at Ozark Natural Foods in Fayetteville, Ark., for 16 years, the last four as produce manager. During that time she put herself through college. Being in charge of $2 million worth of produce annually has taught her the value of careful and meticulous planning as well as general management skills.

Mike and Malinda Taylor own, and along with their three sons operate, Horsehead Ranch in Talala, Okla. They are Brangus seedstock producers raising and selling purebred Brangus bulls and fancy replacement heifers. Ranching is Mike’s passion; he is a fourth generation farmer and rancher. His great grandfather’s brand was the horsehead dating back to the beginning of Oklahoma's statehood. Mike not only continues to use the horsehead brand but also named his ranch after it.