Rinde Farms LLC Outstanding Conservationists of the Year
by Deja Anton
Todd Soil and Water Conservation District Manager
Photos submitted by the Rinde family
Sitting on the front porch of the Rinde patriarchal home one rainy afternoon, grandkids skipping happily in and out the front door, it becomes quickly evident as to why all three of Roger and Bonnie’s children returned home to the farm.
Roger smiles at his grandchildren’s busyness with a quiet pride and the kind of love only a grandfather can have when admiring his own offspring.
Little Eli wants to be a farmer when he grows up while Henry, 6, can tell you every make and model of tractor out there. Holden is dead set on becoming an infantryman in the army and the others—there are nine grandkids total—dream of careers ranging from an electrician, to a sheriff, to a forage harvester specializing in chopping corn, to a herpetologist— one who studies snakes.
Gazing between the drips of rain rolling off the porch roof, there’s a nicely manicured vegetable garden growing strong, flowering bushes that be-speckle the dips and knolls of a freshly mown lawn, a swing set, a sand area for playing trucks, and tall shade trees with arching branches, like arms, embracing the front yard.
Behind the yard, lined up in white rows, are the calf hutches, the calf barn with automatic feeders, young stock and heifer sheds with a concrete travel lane connecting all things living to the old stanchion barn—the center of the Rinde farm for the past 38 years.
Roger and wife, Bonnie, with their infant son, Justin, purchased the farm in 1982 moving from Leader where Roger had farmed with his dad.
Bonnie took a teaching position in the Special Education Department at Browerville Public Schools while Roger got busy milking 40 head of Holstein cows.
Two more children came along and the farm did not expand for the next 25 years while the kids were growing up.
Justin, who attended Central Lakes College in Staples for Heavy Equipment Operation and then went on to Omaha, came home to join the grain farm in 2002.
Roger and Bonnie’s second son, Jeff, was away at school in Fergus at that time, but it wasn’t long before the call of the farm lead him back home, too. He joined the dairy farm in 2006. By then Roger was already switching a dozen head of cows.
In 2007, they built the first free-stall barn walking 72 milk cows back to the stanchion barn to be milked twice a day.
In 2008, they retrofitted a Swing-8 parlor into the old stanchion barn.
In 2009, daughter Kayla joined in on the operation after trying cosmetology and working as a veterinary technician. She was eager to focus on the raising of the calves and young stock.
It was then that the farm transitioned to an LLC between Roger and all three of his children. . . .