One night in 1985 I got a conspiratorial phone call. The unidentified caller whispered that a farm was going to be taken back from the bank the next day, and I should be there. I was an agriculture reporter with CBC-TV news at the time. The group taking back the farm wanted coverage to show how the poor farmer was being victimized by the evil bankers, and how the neighbours were pulling together to do something about it.

 It was one of the saddest stories I ever covered. Not because the man was losing his farm to the bank, but because he had never learned how to manage a farm in the first place.

 When I pulled into the farm yard with my cameraman the next morning, a quick look around told me this was a backward operation. The whole place looked run down. The house didn’t even have running water or indoor plumbing. In one corner of the farmyard was the concrete base for a Harvestore Silo that had never been erected, and there was no evidence the silo was needed to begin with.

 The unfortunate couple who were losing their farm were in their mid-fifties. As I interviewed them, the real story unfolded.

 The man’s father had died about four years earlier. Besides the farm, he’d owned a small construction company, and he made all the decisions for both operations. The ‘boy’ worked the farm, but never managed it. When the old man died, the ‘boy’, now more than fifty years old, finally got the chance to try some of the things he had always wanted to.

 The farm was debt-free when he inherited it, but within a few years he had run up a loan he could not repay. To the bank’s credit, it had hired a consultant to work with the farmer. The consultant should have lost his license for going along with the ‘boy’s’ wildly optimistic plans.

 There were a lot of city media reporters there that day who dutifully told the ‘victim farmer, evil banker’ story as planned. I didn’t.

 I have seen and heard of similar situations over the years... the old man dies, and leaves the ‘kid’, who is usually in his fifties or even sixties, in charge of a farm he has never made a significant management decision on. Invariably, he goes bankrupt.

 There is a natural arc to a human life. When men and women hit their fifties, they go through some physical and psychological changes that make them better suited to passing their knowledge on to the next generation, and making greater contributions to the larger community, than keeping on with the same old routine.

 Other societies have known this for a long time, and acted accordingly. We seem to be slow at it. Especially us men.

 I have talked to literally thousands of farm and ranch families over the years, most of whom hope at least one of their children will be interested in taking over the farm. But the men don’t want to let go of control, and it won’t work any other way.

 If you are hoping one of your kids will want to take over the farm, you MUST do a few things:

• Start by giving the child at least one enterprise that he or she is totally in charge of. They make all the decisions, and when someone such as a feed salesman or buyer calls and asks you about it, you tell them to talk to your son or daughter.

• Have regular meetings - weekly is best - and do more listening than talking

• Make a working agreement and succession plan, in writing, with dates for when you will turn over full control of the operation and start enjoying your retirement.

 You may need some professional help working through the details, including having an outside facilitator help your family talk to each other about what each person wants. And for sure you will need professional advice in drawing up the legal succession plans. Get it.

 Then get on with helping your son or daughter become a successful manager. And don’t wait until they are 50 and you are old and decrepit. If you simply HAVE to be in charge all the time, pray none of your kids will be dumb enough to try farming with you and get some therapy.