Hempstead County Farm Family of the Year

By Staff, 06/25/18 12:39 PM

HEMPSTEAD COUNTY- Congratulations to the Collums family for being selected as the 2018 Hempstead County Farm Family of the Year.

The family run farm consists of owners Jeff and Jane Collum’s, their son Jacob Collums, their daughter Emily Collums Salisbury and, son in law Chris Salisbury. Jacob works alongside his father in the welding business and Chris keeps the farms equipment such as tractors, trucks, and welding equipment running on a daily basis.

Jeff has been a member of the Cattlemens Association since 2010, and Jane is a member of the Hempstead County Master Gardeners, the Arkansas Extension Homemakers Club, the Southwest Arkansas Bee Keepers Association, the Hempstead County Fair Board, the Southwest District Livestock Show Fair Board, the Hope Farmers Market Board, and is a member the Cattlemens Association.

When the Collums family first started their farming career 30 years ago they had 72 acres of land today they have 802 acres of land for the operation. Their farm consists of 100 head of cattle, chicken poultry houses, bee keeping with 28 hives, a welding business, and an acre that they have created into a vegetable garden. As Farmers Market vendors they supply fresh vegetables from their own garden.

Since starting their farm they have made improvements along the way such as creating two ponds on their land. One of the ponds was created to help stop erosion of the land and the other was created for a water source for their cattle. In the future they hope to increase their herd of cattle, and maintain more poultry houses.