By CELESTE BAUMGARTNER
Ohio Correspondent

HAMILTON, Ohio — Folks on six Butler County farms breathed a huge sigh of relief on a recent fall Sunday as the last of the Butler County Farm/City tour visitors pulled out of their driveways – those farmers, their families and friends had played host to 2,500 people during the tour.

“I was pleasantly surprised by the number of people that participated. This tour was above average in attendance because we had a variety of stops and good people for them to visit,” said Steve Bartels of The Ohio State University extension, which is part of the planning committee,

“We have the Farm/City tour to try to show the community what farmers do on a daily basis,” said Kevin Fall, district administrator of the Butler Soil and Water Conservation District and also part of the committee.

Much agricultural publicity is negative, whether it concerns the economy, the occasional instances when animals are mistreated or concerns about pesticides and fertilizers, Fall said.

“It’s one of those things where you can talk or advertise all you want but when people get to come and see how your farm works for free, it’s a good faith effort,” he said.

The farm families who host the October tour get involved in the planning process in June. Everything they do is voluntary “because they believe in that mission, how important it is,” Fall said. In addition to cleaning up and making sure the buildings are safe for visitors to walk through, they have to talk with their insurance agents and their legal advisors.

“They have to have all of these things prepared and discussed and thought out so they can suit thousands of people coming through their property in two days,” Fall said.

They also plan hands-on activities, since everyone likes them. Kids on this year’s tour had lots of opportunities to pet animals … and hand sanitizer to use afterward. Kids also had to be coaxed away from sandbox-like boxes of shelled corn, and there was even a pin-the-tail-on-the-cow game.

“The other thing we get a lot of comments on is signage,” Fall said. “People like to learn and they want to know what everything is, and a lot of time we as farmers take that for granted. A sign saying this piece of machinery is a manure spreader, it can hold this much manure and it spreads it on the fields this way – goes a long way.”
The visitors appreciate the efforts. On one tour, a family brought a loaf of homemade bread to give to the farmers.

“They couldn’t fathom the idea of a free tour,” Fall said. “Everybody walked up to registration tables with money in hand. They could not understand these families donate all their time, their property, to let people see what they do.”

Visitors had a chance to see John and Marilyn Niemans’ Nursery and Christmas Tree Farm; Alpaca Corner, owned and operated by Mary, Sally and John Francis; Tim Hesselbrock’s grain farm; show cattle at Allen and Cathy Minges’ farm; Crosswind Farm, where Cathy and Jay Jacob raise thoroughbred horses; and Carl and Sarah Summes’ dairy farm.