MENAN, Idaho (KIFI) – Even as snow dusts the plains of Menan, its farmers are still hard at work.
Jordon Raymond grows corn and hay across 900 acres of land.
“It used to be that you could work all summer and then kinda take it easier in the wintertime,” he said. “Unless you’re running 10,000 acres, it’s hard to take winters off anymore.”
The Raymonds have owned the land for four generations.
“I think this farm’s been here for probably at least 100 years or so,” Jordan confirmed.
But Jordon can’t run it like his father did.
“It’s hard, it’s really hard, to run a farm this size and just do farming,” he said.
The U.S.D.A.’s Census of Agriculture, which is published every five years and was updated Wednesday, shows Idaho is losing more farms than the national average. From 2017 to 2022, nearly one in ten Idaho farms shut down.
While the census shows the Gem State lost more than 2,000 farms over five years, the average farm grew 8 percent in size. That means small outfits are shutting down at a much faster rate.