Urban sprawl

Don't want to detract from the buying land thread. What is a stake here is the perception of the average consumer living in a urban environment of farming in general. All I typed in was "how much land is used for agriculture in the US" because I was curious. The very first thing that pops up included this.

"The USDA report concludes that urbanization and rural residences (subdivisions) "do not threaten the U.S. cropland base or the level of agricultural production." This does not mean sprawl doesn't have impacts where it occurs. But the notion that sprawl is the greatest threat to biodiversity is absolutely false.

Conclusions that place sprawl ahead of agriculture in terms of biodiversity impacts are due to faulty accounting methods and a general bias that favors agriculture as a "good" use of the land."

So I looked a little more.US farmers plant about 349 million acres of crops each year with only 3 million being used for vegetables. Some 788 million acres are grazed.

"Despite acreage being paved over, malled over or overbuilt with condos, developed land is generally concentrated in and near cities. The loss of farm or ranch land is insignificant compared to the total acreage available in the U.S."

Here is the thing farmers. You can sit here on farm tractor site and argue till the cows come home GMO's, sustainable, organic and everything under the sun. 99% of the US population isn't farmers and the only connection with a farm is what the chew and swallow.So someone throws a scare at them. Says GMO's will make your belly button fall off. So they get on a cell phone or computer and start looking and they find that. They don't read the whole thing, just enough to be dangerous. Then they see something in the news about farmers yelling about urban sprawl. What's their reaction? They think farmers are liars. And if they are lying about urban sprawl what else are they lying about? This is what you have to combat.

For what it's worth, that copy/paste from that report? Was written buy a guy who doesn't think people should eat our animal friends. In the same report he blames farmers for about 65% of the endangered species list too. You farmers and the various farm groups need to fight these people.

Rick

The biggest thing I see here is urban money coming in here and trying to dictate to everybody else. Land for recreation had been underpriced compared to other parts
of the Northeast so that brought the well heeled retirees to Central and Western New York. Land quality can very greatly in a running mile here so there can be land that
is not much good for anything other than horses or hunting next to a for profit farm business. The guy coming in from NYC, Boston, or Philly often thinks that he is the
smartest guy in the township because he cashed out big from the city and set himself up as nobility out in the sticks.

Well said, and then that same smart city guy puts his land into a forever wild conservancy so he does not have to pay land taxes.
Then he demands that the dirt road by his house be paved, his garbage picked up at roadside, the farmer next door sweep the mud off now "His" road, and the list goes on!!! Who pays for all that??? Not him.
Loren

986, Loren, be that as it may that still doesn't help the farmer get across to the average consumer that he isn't an evil person. You know, the average consumer who votes! But when the average consumer does see something on the news and they decide to check it out and that's what they find? Meanwhile all the farmers are either telling each other how great they are or they are on a forum like this doing it. Meanwhile 99% of the population doesn't even know what YT is. So the people most important to talk to are totally missed and mislead by what they find.

Rick

Well, I'm sure you know the old saying, You can lead a horse to water, but -------. I see lots of
advertising from Farm Bureau, national beef board and many other co-operatives. Do consumers pay any
attention???. Who knows.
Loren

Couple that with the fact only something like 40% of U.S. arable land is under cultivation and you can see we are not going to run out of food anytime soon.

I would agree, it is a small percentage.

On another beef, I am a farm bureau member. It gripes me that they spend money on lobbyists to say how good farmers are doing on improving water quality, when in reality a large percentage of Farmers are not doing much of anything.

One sees farmers that are heads of ag organizations like N C G A or Farm Bureau interviewed on network TV or Ag Business programs once in a while and more often lately. Who is the viewing audience ? Likely our civilian population. Do these shows give the impression farmers are evil ? "they think farmers are liars" is not an accurate statement about what is seen broadcast on these shows.

I would agree, do not think anyone sees farmers as liars or cheats, or anything close.

It's not too difficult to look up most town's projections for 20, 30 and 50 year growth. Keep in mind that those are wildly usually optimistic and actual growth will be far less than projected.

Recently a farmer was complaining to the local newspapers about land loss when the county wanted to expand a dangerous intersection to make it safer. The farmer would loose 1.3 acres to the expansion and he was howling and threatening to take the issue to court even though the county was offering more than average price for the loss of his 1.3 acres.

The land that is the most economical to farm pretty much is already in production. I would bet that the other 60 percent needs either irrigation or tile drainage and may have a growing season or frost free date issue.

Go talk to city dwellers in general. They have it in mind that GMO's are bad and Roundup even worse. That the farmer doesn't care about safety or quality, only bottom line.

Heck, I'm in a rural community. Local young lady who's husband works for an RDO owned JD dealership has a 5 year old son. She is convinced that farmers and the AG industry is going to kill her son. If it says "may contain GMO grains" in it she wont buy it. But even the local demographics have changed. Back in 73/74 this area was all small dairies with a few hogs and sheep thrown in. 160-200 acres. 70% of the population were farmers or worked directly in an AG related job. Today that figure is 7%.

Loren you say they run ads? You live in a city area? Do you see what most of the population is seeing? Heck I was in the Army a long time. I use to love to come home and actually see ads on TV that dealt with AG. What I saw when I was at Bliss or Knox? "Milk it does a body good". That was it. Know what was on for AG news? NOTHING!

sourgum ag stuff on the news? Unless it's a station that caters to farmers about the only time you see ag in the main stream news is when the media is trying to expose the "truth" about subsidies or trying to discredit farmers complaining about poor prices. Not tlaking about the news you watch. You have to take a look at what they are watching. The main stream media hasn't been kind to farmers in years.

986, I have no idea how good or bad that land is. Thing is these same city folks can look stuff up. They see that 60% of tillable land is idle. They don't see the quality of the land. They see that it's idle. Then they see that 40% of corn goes into ethanol and 60% of beans. They don't say OH goody renewable fuel. They have the ability to think. They think well if enough food is a problem then why are we putting food in our gas tanks.

What some of you guys should do is watch some youtube. No not of farm brown and his cow but of AG speakers at universities and listen to the question and answers period. Some of these people, soon to have a degree, have absolutely no idea about farms or farming. These people will soon be our doctors, lawyers, bankers and politicians. Some are really scary.

I'm not trying to start a fight here. I see things going downhill for farmers with a lot to do with attitudes owned by people who have no idea. Look at the first bit I posted. That guy is a college professor who also tours giving talks at other colleges. He's telling these kids today that the farmer is responsible for at least 60% of the animals currently on the endanger species list. You don't think these young people today see farmers in a good light?

Rick

Historically, the profit in agriculture is minimal therefore economics requires that farmers utilize land that needs the least amount of inputs beyond seed and fertilizer.
This usually is land that can be tilled in the warmer season with minimal effort due to slope, drainage, and tilth. I'd be very interested in knowing how this 60 percent
figure was arrived at. Around the time of WWI a lot of land here in NY was farmed for wheat that would not today allow for mechanization due to slope. Knowing some
of the ground in question I don't know how the horse was able to remain upright while pulling a drawn single bottom plow. I've seen old records of 100 years ago
showing crop practices for given counties in my area and where specifically. One county in particular a great difference can be seen between 1919 and 2019 in terms
of acres devoted to certain crops. Further, these are university-state derived numbers and not those of a realtor or other private business purpose. I wonder how
these old records impacts surveys of today. The lands down in NY's Southern Tier that grew that wheat that went to Europe 100 years ago gradually went back to wild
growth.

I agree with your statement about how the average consumer today is educated in terms of agriculture. Another reason why I think food from the lab will be the
prevalent nutrient source in a couple of generations and most people will not be upset about it. About the only thing most people care about when wanting fresh is
vegetables and fruits which is a small fraction of overall acres. Another reason not to play the "one up" game in terms of bidding land because you don't to be the guy
holding the bag when it all comes crashing down.

Where my farm is it used to be very rural,now its in the middle of what I'd guess many would call urban sprawl or suburbia.My new neighbors are nothing like what most rural people on here describe or imagine they might be,most are very educated,practical,and very nice people.A larger percentage of them have gardens and know more about growing things like fruit trees,vegetables and the like than most 'real' farmers I know these days.Many are retired with really nice big houses and that is great they pay a lot of real estate tax and send no kids to school,taxes on my
farm land are low as a result because these folks want to preserve what is left of the open farm land in the county and they know low taxes will encourage that.They are a lot better educated
on farming in general than most farmers would think they are too.Not one of these people has a bull that will tear up the line fence and get in with my cows either,no dogs running around killing livestock,police and emergency have about a 5 minute response time.Not saying there are some not so great people here either but they usually mellow out over time once they get it figured out that being a Big Shot where they came from doesn't carry over here as this place is full of people that used to be Big Shots.

We have hundreds of thousands of acres of road ditch that could be farmed if push came to shove. It already has drainage grade in place, nice black dirt spread on top and grass clover mix seeded that is growing quite well. No, it cannot be farmed with 24 row equip. but would do well with 2 row equip or by hand. If you are hungry you will figure out how to do it. And think of all the 2 acre estates or 1 acre lots that have huge back yards. We could bring back the big backyard garden with a couple fruit tress in the corner of lot. We are not doing it now because we don't need to but like I said, if push came to shove:::

Keep Citiots in apartments and build them YMCAs to play in , they
aint got no biznez out in the country where good folks are trying
to make a living , They are only part of agriCULTURE as a a end
user. Citiots have sqaundered and ruined the Inocence of Good hard
Working people that have made America

to 01,

You are so lost on the root cause of family farm loss, it is not city people moving in, it is corporate farms. Many city people are more than happy to rent farms out to smaller operators because they like the relationship. They pay a lot of taxes on the property that brings money into the county. Rural farming without these influxes is breaking these counties. The residents have no jobs and are turning to drugs.

This is not to say they also move in and then start complaining about smells, noise, working times, like before daylight in the spring and fall or late nights like midnight or later. With weather coming, and needing to get crops planted or combined. This is just the tip of the iceberg. Then there is the voting for many lavish projects, that will not fit into the scope of the equipment being used. Or stupid things like traffic circles on interstate entrances. So trucks have trouble making the turns. That is not just a farmer thing either.

You sir are an uneducated piece of work.

(quoted from post at 00:43:59 01/15/19) Keep Citiots in apartments and build them YMCAs to play in , they
aint got no biznez out in the country where good folks are trying
to make a living , They are only part of agriCULTURE as a a end
user. Citiots have sqaundered and ruined the Inocence of Good hard
Working people that have made America

Click to expand...

Shaking my dang head.