30 2024 Farm Family Salute June 2024 as well as for the land and livestock is a powerful thing,” Larry said.“ Life on the farm taught my boys the importance of caring for something besides themselves and never giving up when things get tough or don’ t go the way you hoped.”
Larry and BeAnn believe the lessons learned growing up on the farm are things their children carried into other areas of their lives, like the importance of repairing things when you can, and earning money to buy your own car by hauling square hay bales in the hot summer by hand, even when you could only make enough money to buy an old car and share with your twin brother.
“ The boys learned the value of feeding a show steer in the morning and after school, and breaking it to lead and grooming it for a year before you find out how you placed,” BeAnn said.“ The value of learning to compete with other agriculture students who become your best friends.”
“ Not only did they take care of their own show steers mornings and evenings as their personal projects, they helped us every time we needed them,” Larry said.
“ They tore out old fences and replaced them with new ones, bottle-fed calves when we also had a dairy for three years, and did the milking one summer when mom took a job in town to help out financially. They helped with gathering cattle out of the fields and vaccinating them, helped deliver and tag baby calves. They helped tear down and remodel barns that were old.”
“ They learned to drive tractors and other machinery on the farm to help put up hay in the summer and move cattle in trailers to sale barns and their show steers and equipment to local and national shows,” BeAnn added.“ And of course, they also had to clean out stalls daily. They spent every spring break helping on the farm. We didn’ t tell them that other people went on vacation.”
The Walkers say the main difference between farming and ranching today and 50 years ago when they started off with their family farm is the cost.
“ The equipment is amazing at what it can do. It makes it easier on a person’ s body and the time it takes to do a particular thing is less, but it
Congratulations 2024 Washington County Farm Family of the Year Larry & Be-Ann Walker
3401 E Mission Blvd. Fayetteville, AR 72703 479-587-1122