Some of their fondest memories of that time revolve around their grandfather, Haja, who had to take a step back from much of the manual labor following a farming accident. Despite his injury, he remained involved in the operation and enjoyed being a gracious and energetic host to anyone who came by the home place.

“I have tremendous memories of Grandpa, not so much farming, but just spending time with us while we were working,” Craig said. “He would bring lunches out to us. If the fuel man came to the yard, he’d invite him in for coffee. Grandpa loved his coffee time with people, so he always would invite them in.”

As the boys grew older, it wasn’t always clear they would end up on the farm together. Craig had the notion of becoming a musician. After graduating high school from Worthington, Minnesota, he attended community college, eventually moving to Nashville in 1989 with a friend to try to hack it as a songwriter. On the other hand, Mark always felt more at home on the farm. He, too, had the intention of going through college, but his tenure was short-lived.

“I kept wanting to come home and work on the farm,” he said. “I ended up just doing one semester, then decided to quit and start farming. I wouldn’t ever tell anyone not to go to college, but for our circumstances it ended up actually working out pretty good.”

Unfortunately, the circumstances in question revolved around their father, Les, suddenly falling ill with stomach and gallbladder problems.

“He avoided the hospital for a long time, but got sicker and sicker until he had to go to Mayo,” Craig said. “He’d gotten to the point where we were going to bring him home the next day, but then it turned out he had internal bleeding. Within a couple of days, he was gone.”

“At that point, we had to make some decisions. You know how it is – you’re put into a situation and have to make decisions. Mark was back on the farm alone, and at that point I just knew what I was supposed to do. God had a plan for me, and it wasn’t in Nashville. It wasn’t even a hard decision. It was just what I needed to do. But in the back of my mind, I think I always knew farming was going to be a part of my life.”

So, after the passing of their father, the brothers decided to work together to run the operation. Mark had the advantage of four or five years of full-time experience, and he was grateful for the time he was given to learn the ropes with his father.

“You can’t trade that for anything,” he said. “Maybe it’s because he was an older dad, but he was very willing to give up the reins. He forced me to make decisions that I didn’t want to. I didn’t know what to do and just had to figure it out. Little things like that helped. Craig coming back just kind of made things fall into place.”

Even so, the first few years were the toughest, and not just from a workload standpoint. Their father had passed away in 1990. Other relatives whose land they farmed passed away around the same time, so most of the land they farmed had to be purchased to retain access to acres.

“Here we were, young guys borrowing money like crazy just trying to keep land,” Mark said. “That was the most stressful part. Actually raising the crops, that part didn’t bother us. Back in the 1990s, crop prices were rotten, and we had terrible growing seasons with rotten crops, so it was a little bit tougher to get the financing and to be sure of it.”

Despite these troubles, the brothers put their heads down and just did the work. Perhaps it was a coping mechanism for their grief; perhaps it was their work ethic; perhaps it was some combination of these factors; but for them, it simply seemed better not to stop and think about it, but rather just focus on doing what needs to be done while trying to stay positive.

“We had a lot of hurdles we had to cross, but I don’t think either one of us felt like there was something we couldn’t do,” Craig said. “Mark had a really good ability to lead and he understood the farm. We just went out and worked and made mistakes, persevered from them, and learned from our experiences. We just looked to the next day, decided what we had to do, and just did it.”

Reflecting on their younger selves, the Hayengas are rightfully proud of what they overcame back in their early 20s, but they wouldn’t wish those circumstances on anyone.

“I don’t think we realized how young we were,” Craig said. “At 22, you think you can conquer the world. Looking back, I’d hate if my son was 22 and had to do this, but we just did it.”

Although the brothers had kind of a rough start, things began to turn the corner in the mid-90s. Crop prices began to rise, so Mark and Craig began figuring out ways to use that income to improve their land for the long term, rather than just focusing on getting through tomorrow. The very first problem they addressed? Drainage.

“When we first started farming, so much of our land wasn’t tiled properly, and it drove me nuts having to go back and replant and fill those holes,” Mark said. “I couldn’t stand going through all those mud holes and getting stuck. We decided we’d had enough. We didn’t have a lot of money, but we tiled every year and have done it every year since. It wasn’t like my dad didn’t tile – we just took it to a new level. We’ve put in a lot of feet of tile and there isn’t a single foot we put in we wish we hadn’t.”

After that, the Hayengas became early adopters of precision fertility, beginning with grid sampling on 4.4-acre grids as far back as 1997. At the same time, they got their first yield monitors. With this information, they were able to begin fixing their soil pH with lime and applying fertility with variable rate applications. Their goal was to be more efficient in their nutrient applications and save money where they could, as while they were working to improve things, margins were still thin.

There were some bumps in the road as the worked to fine-tune their fertility plan to include removal minimums, but the Hayengas’ attention to detail and drive for learning more information kept them on a path of constant advancement. One limitation in these early developmental years was a lack of readily available information in the fertility space. However, that shortage of information came to an end once they started working with the agronomists at the nearby Hefty Seed Company location in Sheldon, Iowa.

“The big thing we’ve gotten from Hefty’s is the amount of information that they teach you,” Craig said. “There have been so many things starting with fertility and micros, seed and population. Base saturation is a big one. Most of what we did before was with co-ops and universities, and we’d never heard of base saturation. It was never on any of our soil tests and never told to us by any agronomists we’d worked with. We had what we thought were good potash levels, but when we started looking at our base saturation, it was like – whoa, we’ve got some work to do.”

The cation exchange capacity (CEC) of their soils average in the upper 20s and low 30s – relatively heavy ground – so, while soil tests measuring potassium in parts per million had historically rated ‘high’ by their lab, once the Hayengas started getting base saturation results, they realized most of their acres were relatively low – between 1% and 2% base saturation, when the goal was to be near 4%.

In addition to fertility, they appreciate the insights into seed and chemical choices provided by their Hefty Agronomist, Adam Sauer.

“Adam is really good,” Mark said. “If we have an issue in the field, anytime we call him, he’s up here helping us figure out what’s going on. He helps us make seed and chemical decisions. Whenever we have a question, he’s easy to get ahold of with an answer. If he doesn’t know, he will find out for us.”

When it comes to seed, one area of the Hefty lineup they really are grateful for is 40 Series Corn, which is designed for planting in soils as cold as 40 degrees so long as conditions are fit for planting. This option resonates with the Hayengas because their dad always hammered into them the need to get out planting as early as possible.

“It was bred into us,” Craig said. “Back in the 80s, our dad was an early planter. We’ve always planted in April, and it works a lot better to plant early now than it did back then. That seed treatment is a huge advantage. We had problems with pythium and phytophthora and lost our stands and really hurt our yields. Now, the treatments make things a lot easier.”

Mark and Craig Hayenga are meticulous and always hungry for knowledge. They regularly attend Ag PhD informational meetings and work closely with their agronomists and research staff at Hefty Seed Company, as they see a like-minded kinship in their drive to learn newer and better ways to grow crops and gain success in their operation.

“There isn’t a better group of people to work with,” Mark said. “The whole crew they’ve put together is just top of the line. We’ve learned so much from them about fertility, Naturals, and more. We always pick something up, and there’s always something more you can learn.”

“We really appreciate everything that Brian and Darren do,” Craig said. “And what we really appreciate about them is that while they own companies to sell products, their meetings aren’t about selling products. They’re about teaching us and helping us do better on the farm. If we knew 30 years ago what we know now – then, we could be a lot more dangerous.”