Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

By Carey Reeder | Managing Editor

Two agricultural facilities in Chilton County were featured in the Alabama Farmers Federation’s Farm and Land Conference from Aug. 1-3. The conference had six different tours on it that had stops at 18 different farms, universities and agricultural businesses across 12 counties in Alabama.

Hundreds of farmers from across Alabama gathered in Montgomery and dispersed out across the state on Aug. 2. Parnell Farms in Stanton was featured as a stop on the Yellow Tour along with the Autauga Farming Company and Cleveland Land and Cattle in Autauga County. Brooke Ginn participated in the Yellow Tour of the conference and said that Parnell Farms caught her eye during the tour of the facility. Ginn operates a cow-calf operation in Calhoun County as her day job, and plans to take some of the things she learned on the tour and put them towards her own operation back home.

“At Parnell Farms, I enjoyed getting to see the layout of his catch pen,” Ginn said. “I will definitely go home and try to implement some of what I’ve learned into my family’s operation.”

On the Red Tour of the conference, Petals from the Past in Jemison was a stop for the group, joined by Green Valley Farms in Montevallo and Riverwalk Stadium in Montgomery. The group on the tour had some prominent figures among them, including President of the Alabama Pecan Growers Association Bran Futral. Futral is from Randolph County and was impressed by Petals from the Past, and plans to make another stop at the businesses in the near future.

“My favorite thing is honestly traveling around with people who also produce specialty crops. You feel the camaraderie. We loved the stop at Petals from the Past, and we plan to come back,” Futral said. “To be able to spend time together with other farmers, I think it’s important. It reminds me that we are not alone. There are others struggling with the same challenges, like economics and weather. We are all about this kind of thing. When they set the date for this conference, we’re down.”

Both Parnell Farms and Petals from the Past offered tours of their facilities and gave pointers on certain realms of agriculture while the tours were on site.