Tips to Take Your Family on a Farm and Ranch Tour During the Holidays

My wife, Christine, and I decided to take our grandchildren to farms in our area in 2017 after reading a report that more than 16 million Americans believed chocolate milk came from brown cows. Although neither one of us grew up on a farm, I worked for farmers and ranchers when I was in high school and her dad, Tom Wallace, managed the Circle E Feedlot. 

However, as our children were having children, we realized that, at the time, they all lived in cities and had little, if any, understanding of where their food came from or the people who raised it. Therefore, we started the McNary Cousins Farm and Ranch Tour for the five grandchildren we had at the time. Our family has grown to nine grandchildren, and we are planning our Holiday Farm and Ranch Tour during their Christmas break from school. Here are a few tips to make it a fun and educational trip:

1. Contact a local farm or ranch and ask them if they’d be willing to let your family tour their operation. Please know that if there is any hesitancy on the part of the farmer or rancher, it is most likely because of liability issues; they worry about people being injured on their farm. You can find willing farmers and ranchers online at www.shopkansasfarms.com or contact your local county Farm Bureau.
2. Ask the farmer/rancher to explain how things work with the food they grow. Most of them have done it so much, they forget sometimes that people who don’t live or work on a farm have no idea how things work.
3. Ask the farmer/rancher to explain how the business end of it works, how they make money from the crops or livestock they grow. For many children who are not raised on a farm, animals are seen as pets and not as a part of a business, however, farmers and ranchers still care about their animals very much.
4. Ask the farmer/rancher if they have any products you can purchase. Not only does this help them, but it also reinforces to your children that farming and ranching is a business.
5. Educate the children before you go as to why you chose that farm/ranch and what you hope they will learn from their time there. It also helps if you advise them that farm equipment is not playground equipment. A child crawling over a tractor makes most farmers a bit nervous.
6. Make it into a scavenger hunt. For example, What’s the biggest animal there? What’s the smallest animal? How many kinds of animals can we find?
7. Take several photographs to give to the farmer/rancher and keep for yourselves. This visual history is priceless.
8. Follow up with thank you notes. Even if the best your children or grandchildren can do is scribble an indecipherable line, the simple act of sending a hand-written thank you note teaches gratitude to the sender and creates joy for the receiver. Maybe the children can draw a depiction of the farm or an animal they saw.
9. Talk to a local butcher. This is a great opportunity to teach your grandchildren about the importance of meat and nutrition in our diets. Talk to your local grocery store butcher, or better yet, take them to a local meat processor near you.
10. Buy them books. Kansas Farm Bureau has excellent resources to help your grandkids learn about agriculture. In addition, the Ag in the Classroom series teaches kids how food is grown.

As a grandparent, I’m always looking for exciting and educational adventures to build memories with my grandchildren. The best part of a farm and ranch tour for me is knowing I have introduced my grands to my heroes; the farm and ranch families of Kansas who grow the food we eat.