As young people struggle to get their footing in Montana’s agriculture industry, development threatens the state’s farming future.

Photo of Hugh Spencer by Thom Bridge, Helena Independent Record.

JORDAN UNGERWINTER 2022

HUGH SPENCER began learning the ins and outs of his family’s poultry farm business in upstate New York while just a child. His father gave him some chicks as a present on his eighth birthday. For the most part, Spencer has been raising chickens ever since.

“I enjoyed the physical labor and the day in, day out aspect of continually doing the chores,” he said. “I loved it. It just fit my personality. I never minded going out to the barn every day to pick up eggs.”

Spencer later migrated out West. In 1981, toward the tail end of his 20s, he and his wife, Vicki, purchased an 80-acre plot of land outside Plains, Montana. Nestled near the state’s western border in Sanders County, the town of Plains — with a population just over a thousand people — hugs the Clark Fork River and is tucked between the Bitterroot Mountains to the south and the Cabinet Mountains to the north.

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The husband-and-wife duo built three chicken barns on the property shortly after purchasing the plot, and initially ran a business producing “hackle” — chicken feathers for fly fishing — before shifting their operation into a full-time egg production farm with free ranging chickens. As members of an agricultural cooperative, they sell about 50 percent of their eggs locally, in Sanders County. The rest are distributed across Montana and Idaho.

Some two thirds of Montana’s agricultural workers are over the age of 55.

Throughout the years, business has been good, and farming has provided Spencer with an unparalleled quality of life. “It’s been wonderful,” he said. “I’d do it all over again. I enjoyed the lifestyle. I enjoyed being able to be outdoors a lot. I enjoyed being able to drop things and do things with my kids that were important to them.”