Discovering Nature's Beauty: Growing Up On A Montana Farm

I Grew Up On A Farm About 10 Miles Out Of Choteau, Montana

Tammie Toren//Canva

As you can clearly see, the homeplace is the stuff farm dreams are made of. A 4 bedroom house, 3 car garage, shop, barn with wooden bins on the side, chicken coop, Quonset, scale house, bunk house, diesel, gas and propane tanks and 3 tall steel grain bins. Plus an huge garden area. It's a pretty cool place.

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My Dad Grew Wheat And Barley

Dad mostly grew both spring wheat and winter wheat, barley for Raineer Beer, and every now and then Durum in the Golden Triangle. The home place was either wheat or summer fallow growing up and the farm was spread out all over the area.

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We Always Drove Around Looking At Crops

One of my favorite things to do with my dad was drive around and looking at all the crops. We didn't just stay in the Choteau area. Daddy leased land from my uncle up in Pendroy, so we'd head up to the Pendroy/Dupuyer area and check out all the crops too. It was fun going to Glacier Park as a kid because from Valier to Browning, the fields would be so pretty all year long, but down right majestic when it was close to harvest. It's such a beautiful sight.

We'd drive around and dad would point out canola, alfalfa, durum, whatever it was that farmer was growing. On some days, we'd pull over and smell the dirt. For a city kid that must sound kind of strange, but farm kids? Knowing what good dirt smells like is just one of the million things your daddy teaches you growing up. To this day, good dirt is one of my favorite smells in the world.

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What Crops Are Grown In Central Montana and What Do They Look Like?

The most common crops are below with a pretty good picture of each plant. That way, your next road trip, you can stop and smell the dirt and get a great picture of a Sainfoin or Canola field and know exactly what you're looking at.