By SHELLY STRAUTZ-SPRINGBORN

Michigan Correspondent

LAPEER, Mich. — A group of Michigan farmers and volunteers reached out to help Oklahoma ranchers who are suffering devastating losses from wildfires that burned more than 400,000 across the state last month.

On April 18, a group of volunteers with the Michigan-based nonprofit Ag Community Relief organization drove from Michigan to Oklahoma to deliver hay to those in areas affected by the fires. While they were there, they continued their efforts by helping move several more loads of hay around to collection points in the state.

Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin declared a state of emergency on April 13 for 52 counties in the drought-stricken region.

Matt Schaller of Lapeer, Mich., is president of Ag Community Relief, which was formed in 2017 after the wildfires in Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas to bring relief to active farmers and ranchers who experience devastation across the United States, by assembling volunteers and donations to help mitigate their suffering.

Schaller, who works for a trucking company, said last year when relief efforts started that he just wanted to help ranchers in Texas by taking some hay to them.

“I put a post out on Facebook that I was trying to find a load of hay to take to Texas,” he said. “What was supposed to be one truckload turned into 10 semi loads.”

Since its start, Ag Community Relief has put more than 60 loads of relief out on the road, including hay and other types of feed and ag supplies. Schaller said he never dreamed how quickly the effort would grow. “I didn’t expect it to turn into this. I just thought we would take a load of hay and help some folks out.”

Jenny Lehman and her husband, Jack, operate Lehman Trucking, Inc. in Howell, as well as a small hobby farm. Jack has made two trips with hay – one to Fargo, N.D., and the other to Beaver, Okla. – to help farmers and ranchers suffering due to wildfires.

Lehman and her daughter are members of the Facebook group “Women in Agriculture,” where they learned of the devastation through ”horrendous photos, videos and posts from other members of the group,” she said.

“I would just sit there and cry. It really got to us. The empathy we feel for these people, we couldn’t just sit there. We had to do something to help,” she explained.

She said through the efforts, her family has made new friends whom they never would have met if not for Ag Community Relief. Being able to do something to help ease their suffering “brings us to tears,” Lehman said. “It really is all about farmers helping farmers.”

Todd Brink, who operates an 800-acre cash crop farm and has a 30-head cow calf herd in Caledonia, also was touched by the group’s efforts and last year travelled to Oklahoma and Montana to deliver hay and fencing supplies. “They're people in need – fellow farmers and ranchers,” he said.

Brink said during a trip to Montana, one of ranchers asked to whom he should write a check. “He couldn’t believe it when we told home he didn’t owe us anything; he was so grateful.”

That particular rancher is just one of the friends he has made on these trips. “It has been a neat journey and experience,” he said.

They all agree the network of donors and volunteers that Ag Community Relief has built in the last year has tremendously helped the organization be able to serve more people in need.

“With the networking created in the last year, we can facilitate where there’s hay and coordinate hauling it,” Brink said.

“Every year that goes by, we meet more and more good people, and the group gets bigger,” Schaller noted. “We have contacts all over.”