Farmers Union Celebrates the Feickert Farm Family of Aberdeen

By Lura Roti for SDFU

 The second oldest of seven, Dennis Feickert grew up on a traditional 1950s South Dakota farm. His dad, Elvin, and mom, Christina, raised pigs, chickens, a cow/calf herd, a 30-cow dairy herd and corn, oats, wheat and hay.

 It was on this 1,200-acre McPherson County farm that a strong desire to work on the land and care for livestock was instilled in Dennis.

 “My passion and my love has always, absolutely been with the cattle and the land and the machinery. That is where my entire energies have always been focused,” he says.

 Although the only career Dennis ever wanted was to be a farmer, when he graduated from high school, the family farm was too small. His dad was young yet and had a large family to support. “So, I moved to Aberdeen and began working for Dakota Farmer magazine and hated it – absolutely despised it,” Dennis says.

 To emphasize how farmsick he was, Dennis tells this story. “It was summer. I would lay in our small apartment with the windows open to catch a breeze and I would smell alfalfa and I would go wacko, absolutely wacko.”

 Because he couldn’t change circumstances and he had a young family to support, instead of farming fulltime, at 21, Dennis joined the Aberdeen City Fire Department and built up a cow/calf herd as time, income and opportunity allowed.

 “I bought about 20 heifers at the sale barn and kept them at the kids’ grandpa’s farm. Then, we bought some 4-H heifers for the kids to show in 4-H and I rented some land and took a guy’s cows on shares and kept a few of those heifer calves,” explains Dennis, of the slow-but-sure way he built up the cow/calf herd to today’s 180-head that he runs together with his son, Jason and daughter, Rebecca’s cows.

 To have enough pasture and hay ground, Dennis rented or purchased small pieces of land close to Aberdeen. Then, in the mid-’70s, 40 acres of land just five miles from Aberdeen came up for sale. Dennis sold a duplex he had renovated and built a house and barn. He finally had his farm.

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