Farming all the time

There are plenty of father-son duos farming together, however what possibly makes Randy Christoffersen and his son Michael unique is that Michael is a second-career farmer.

A few days before Father’s Day, Randy said he didn’t expect that Michael would rejoin him in farming as an adult, but here they are as a dynamic team raising row crops and tending to 135 cow-calf pairs together.

Michael loved spending time with his dad on the farm at a young age, driving the tractor up and down the roads near their operation, based 7 miles south of Casey. He felt on top of the world behind the wheel.

As his school years came along as an Adair-Casey Bomber, Michael became involved in many activities and didn’t spend as much time on the farm. The youngest of four children — his siblings are Jenny (Knutter), Kelly and Tony — Michael graduated in 2010.

Eventually going on to pursue a place in the athletic training world — making a living with it for a season of his life — Michael eventually decided that returning to the farm to work with his dad sounded like a good idea.

“I had no interest in really being a farmer when I graduated high school,” Michael said.

It was about his junior year of college when that attitude began to change for him.

“As I get older, the family heritage and the family legacy plays so much more into it, and I can’t imagine doing anything else,” Michael said. “The older I get, the more I have a joy for farming.”

Randy has called the same spot home for all of his 72 years. The 320-acre main farm traces its roots all the way back to brothers Orville and Wilbur Wright, who were the first to put an airplane in flight in 1903. Their aunt and uncle purchased a half section of land in Prussia Township as an investment, which the Christoffersens own today.

“They built a house for the tenants, and that was the house I was born in,” Randy said.

The house is different now, but Randy has farmed for five and a half decades there. His dad, Norman — born in 1918 — was an Army sergeant who served in World War II. At a somewhat young age, rheumatoid arthritis took over which meant Randy would begin farming right out of high school. His mom, Ardith Christoffersen, still lives in Greenfield.

“When I started farming, every farm had hogs on it and every farm fed cattle. There weren’t many cabs on tractors and I was using little round bales or little square bales of hay,” Randy said. “It’s changed a lot since then.”

Today, Michael enjoys the technological side of farming. He can often be found running the combine or the sprayer. Randy describes himself as less detail-oriented. He says he worries a lot. The contrasting personalities make a good team, they agree.

The peaks and valleys of farming they have experienced together has made a strong father-son relationship seem even stronger, Michael said.

“When the weather or the crop prices aren’t good you’re able to pick each other up. You also celebrate in the high times. You give each other a hug and say that we did alright there when your calves sell or the last crop goes in during the spring,” Michael said.

Michael and his wife Brittany live in Greenfield where they are raising their 3-year-old son Charlie and 1-year-old daughter Kate. Perhaps one or both of them will become part of a sixth generation of Christoffersen farmers.

Randy and his wife, Frankie, have five other grandchildren. They enjoy time away from the farm attending their athletic and fine arts activities when they can.

Charlie has already developed an appreciation for the farm life. He likes riding around with dad in their Ranger to check cows and will tell you when he hears the Ranger or a tractor coming down the road.

Michael credits his dad for all the knowledge he has of agriculture and running a business. For him, a lot of that comes back to sustainability. Michael hopes that even he can be an example of that for his children as they grow up around the farm.

“Building on the sustainability aspect, Charlie loves to ride in the Ranger. Buckling him up in the buddy seat in the tractor to go pick up hay bales, some days he lasts awhile in there and the next day he doesn’t last very long,” Michael said. “He’s farming all the time whether it’s out here or at home making swaths in the carpet.”