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The 2008-09 Bangor FFA officer team recently completed its officer retreat.

The purpose of the trip is to build teamwork among the officers and plan next year’s FFA activities. In addition to planning, the team tours some agribusinesses to see latest advancements in agriculture. This year the team toured the University of Wisconsin-River Falls, Star Prairie Trout Farm, Chippewa Valley Bean, Five Star Dairy and the University of Wisconsin-Stout.

After each tour, the officers write a short summary of what they learned. Officers who were able to attend were president Ashley Anderson, vice president Mandi Peters, reporter Jesse Rabuck, treasurer Christian Thompson and sentinel Sawyer Kerkman. Vice president Siera Holzhausen and secretary Jared Heuer were unable to attend.

The first agribusiness the students toured was Star Prairie Trout Farm in Star Prairie, Wis. After getting a basic understanding and history of the farm, they learned the source of water for the farm comes from underground springs. They toured ponds and saw rainbow trout, and they learned about trout eggs.

On June 6, the team toured two more agribusiness. While at Chippewa Valley Bean, they got to see all the technology and how advanced they are with their operation. The farm raises 4,000 acres of kidney beans and processes one-third of the nation’s crop of kidney beans. There was a machine called the electric eye and it could sort out all the bad beans. Rejected beans go into livestock feed and some qualify for food aid for foreign nations. The farm is always trying to improve their techniques and production.

The second business they toured that day was Five Star Dairy in Elk Mound, Wis. One technology the farm employees is a methane digester, which catches the methane gas from the farm and burns it to make electricity.

The students also had a chance to tour UW-River Falls lab farms and had an official tour of UW-Stout. The team learned a lot from the trip and has an excellent year planned for the chapter next year.