(rooster crowing) - Hey kids.

My name's Donna Kilpatrick.

I'm the head farmer at Heifer Ranch in Perryville, Arkansas.

So glad that you can be with us today.

I'm really excited to show the farm.

Tell you a little bit about what it's like to be a farmer.

There are many types of farms and what we do is we farm with livestock and we also have a garden so we grow animals and also vegetables.

But one of the main things we do is we train farmers.

There are lots of people that wanna learn to be able to farm, and they need a place to come and learn.

So we're it.

If you wanted to be a farmer, you could come to Heifer Ranch and learn how to do that.

Would you guys like to learn how to farm?

Today, I'm gonna show you what farming is all about.

There's lots of different types of farming.

There's livestock farming, there's vegetable farming, there are other types of farming like in Arkansas, we grow tons of rice.

There's also farming that's for fiber.

So our clothes come from cotton that's grown.

That's a type of farming.

There are sheep farming.

We also get fiber that comes sheep.

So lots of the things that you get at the grocery store, actually most of the things that you get at the grocery store come from a farm.

So if you eat things like vegetables or milk, any kind of nuts, that's all a type of farming.

Even things like the wood for building houses, those come from tree farms.

We rely on farmers for almost all of the things that we use daily.

One of my favorite types of farming is livestock farming.

And what that means is I get to work with animals every day.

My favorite type of animal that I work with is cattle, but I also love working with the pigs and our sheep and our chickens and our turkeys.

So one of the things that we do at Heifer Ranch is really focused on caring for the earth.

So of course we care about the livestock that are grazing above the ground, but we're also really interested in the soil and we wanna improve how many earthworms we have in the soil.

How many dung beetles there are.

All the microbes and the biology that happens in the soil, can get better with proper use of livestock.

And one of the ways that we do that is we never leave our livestock at one place.

Right now behind me, you don't see any livestock, but they've been there.

We moved them every single day to a new basically salad bar.

So where they get to eat lots of different plants and help the soil be better.

So one of the things that I love about being a farmer and probably my favorite thing about being a farmer is that the days are never the same.

And a lot of that is based on the seasons.

So for example, in the winter time, maybe we're feeding the cows hay, but in the summertime, we're moving them around to different pastures for them to forage.

Another thing that I really love about farming is that there's lots of cool equipment and technology that you can use to help your job go easier.

For example, we use tractors sometimes, we get around the ranch with ATVs and gators, so that's fun.

Lots of other equipment that other farmers use like big tractors and combine sometimes.

And all of these help farmers do their job better.

So there are a lot of things that you do as a farmer on a daily basis to take care of your ranch or your farm.

Some examples are making sure your animals have water, making sure they have feed, making sure what you're doing as a farmer is good for the soil.

In fact, I need to go feed a baby calf right now.

You guys wanna come with me?

Let's go!

Hey everybody, thanks for helping me feed Sparkles.

Sparkles is a baby calf.

And we feed her every day, actually twice a day.

So she needs milk at this age.

She's a south pole, is the breed of cow that she is.

And isn't she just so beautiful?

We love Sparkles.

Yeah.

So I'm gonna go ahead and feed her.

And what she needs is a bottle every day.

So here we go.

So we feed Sparkles twice a day and she usually drinks a big bottle in the morning and a big bottle at night.

She's also learning how to eat hay and eat grass when she goes outside.

Sparkles is really sweet and she loves people.

Was that good Sparkles?

Thanks for being such a great calf.

I'll see you this afternoon.

I think being a farmer is one of the best jobs in the world.

You wanna be a farmer?

If you think you might wanna be a farmer, I hope someday you'll come out and train with us.

I really enjoyed my time with you and I hope to see you later.

Bye.