Farm family honored

• Mahlbergs

Submitted Photo Rolf and Joan Mahlberg are surrounded by their children and grandchildren in this portrait taken last fall. The family includes Jamie and Ryan (front row, from left), Claire, Brody, Lilly, Nathan, Ethan, Amy, Macie and Ben; and back row, from left: Sarah and Stephen Herrmann; Jonathan, Wilson and Anna.

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WORTHINGTON — Rolf Mahlberg is rather humbled by his family’s recent selection as Nobles County’s Farm Family of the Year because, as he says, he only farms a few hundred acres and once had a small livestock operation on the family’s farm site in Bigelow Township.

It isn’t the size of the farm that matters, though. Mahlberg was selected because of the impact he has had on generations of farm families through his role as an educator.

Next week, Mahlberg and his wife, Joan, along with their four children — Nathan, Jonathan, Ryan and Sarah — and seven grandchildren will be recognized along with 74 other farm families from across the state at Farmfest. The recognition program begins at 1:30 p.m. Aug. 4 in the Forum Tent on the Farmfest grounds near Redwood Falls.

For 36 years, Rolf taught agriculture education in the classrooms of Heron Lake-Okabena High School, Worthington Senior High, then-Worthington Area Junior High and ultimately Minnesota West Community and Technical College.

In between, he served as Adult Farm Business Management instructor for a decade.

While at Minnesota West, he established the Post-secondary Agricultural Students (PAS) program.

“I absolutely enjoy the agriculture picture,” said Rolf. “If you have a passion for what you teach, I think it makes it so much more enjoyable — for (the students) as much as for me.”

Over the years, the Mahlberg farm has been utilized as a teaching tool for students. That was the case this spring, when high school agriculture classes were brought to the farm for students to learn how no-till efforts help to reduce soil erosion.

“There’s so many right ways to farm,” said Rolf, adding that his goal has always been to make sure students understand the terminology and the value of “not letting your farm leave your farm.”

His passion for the land stems from the values instilled upon him and his siblings while growing up, and his message to students is to leave the soil in as good or better condition as when they began farming the land.

“That was the stewardship principle from my father,” said Rolf. “We can’t view the soil that we have and the water that we have as disposable. They both need our guardianship.

“With a smaller farm operation, those types of things were really bestowed on our family,” he added. “The very first thing when Dad bought the farm here was to put in stewardship practices.”

The Mahlbergs reside on the shores of Lake Ocheda, not far from where Rolf grew up. His great-grandfather settled land a couple of miles down the road in the 1870s. Today, Rolf and Joan’s grandchildren represent the sixth generation of the family’s farming tradition in Bigelow Township.

During the years Rolf was growing up, his parents had a diversified operation producing corn, soybeans and hay while raising laying hens, 5,000 turkeys, 10 sows and 30-40 beef animals. Rolf even remembers having one dairy cow on the farm to supply the family with milk in his early years.

When Rolf and Joan, high school sweethearts, made their home on Lake Ocheda, Rolf helped his dad with both the crops and livestock.

“We put the crop in and took the crop out together ever since I moved back from college,” Rolf said.

The beef cattle were sold in 2001, and Rolf now has the roughly 230 acres planted in corn and soybeans, with a portion enrolled in the Conservation Reserve (CRP) and Conservation Stewardship (CSP) programs. In recent years, he has installed two farmable terraces, established a desilting basin, developed buffer strips and completed an enhanced wildlife planting of shrubs and shelterbelts. His farmland is also gridded with soil tests monitored on a two-acre grid basis.

While Rolf farms the land — with twin brother Wes helping to plant and harvest — Rolf and Joan’s two oldest sons are close by to help. Both Nathan and Jonathan built homes on the Mahlberg farm to raise their families.

“Our children just loved being a part of the agricultural scene,” said Rolf.

“They were never bored,” added Joan. “They could always find things to do. They had a lot of fun and I think that’s partly why they both decided to build out here — they loved growing up here so much.”

Both Nathan and Jonathan have careers tied to agriculture with their work for Newport Laboratories in Worthington. Ryan recently resigned his position as a bioscience instructor at Minnesota West to join his wife in Rochester, and daughter Sarah, of Lawrence, Kan., is expecting her second child within the next week.

With seven grandchildren and the eighth on the way, the Mahlbergs are sharing their passion for agriculture and the land with the next generation.

Though now officially retired from teaching, Rolf hasn’t strayed far from the classroom. He continues to mentor first-year agriculture teachers through his alma mater, the University of Minnesota, and teaches sustainability workshops to high school students locally through the Sustainable Inquiry Research and Education Network (SIREN) project. In addition, he serves as vice chair of the Southwest Research and Outreach Center’s advisory board and continues to write a history of farming in southwest Minnesota for the U of M.

Rolf is also serving his 13th year on the Okabena-Ocheda Watershed District board, is a 25-year member of Nobles County Pheasants Forever, and is a member in the recently-formed Lake Ocheda Landowners group, which is looking at ways to improve the health of the prairie lake.

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