TalkErie.com - The Joel Natalie Show - Erie Pennsylvania Daily Podcast · Joel Natalie

Troyers Farming County Land: Colton & Mark Troyer - Apr. 7, 2026

April 8, 2026·44 min·3 clips

Falkland Foods broke ground in August 2024 and was making organic fries by April — with Giant Eagle already committed to shelf space.

The conversation opens with familiar Erie framing. When agriculture comes up, the host says, the Troyers are the people he calls. Mark and Colton explain what rented land does to the math. The question is not only whether a field can grow something. It is whether the money and work make sense when they do not own the ground. One wet section can change the whole call. The host puts it back in plain language: inputs, labor, and time can vanish if harvest comes and that section is underwater. Sometimes they leave sections alone. That may sound cautious, but the guest makes it clear that skipping bad ground can beat planting into a spot that gives almost nothing back. Drainage comes next. The host asks the practical question farmers face when they take on land they do not know well. Improvements get complicated. The guest says he and his dad like putting money into land, but some fixes may take 20 years to pay back. Rented ground tightens the choices. They are doing some tiling and fixing existing tile, partly because the agreement calls for parts of the system to work again. Then the talk turns to potatoes. The host moves from land management to the crop calendar, asking when planting and harvest happen. They aim to finish by mid-May, with June as the outside window. The earliest fresh crop digging usually starts around mid-August, and those potatoes go right to processing. Storage potatoes need a couple more weeks to mature. Baby potatoes get sorted out too. Some are harvested early, but the guest also explains that some varieties naturally produce more small tubers. The ending pulls back a bit. The host connects the farm story to Erie's need to make things that sell outside the region and bring money back home. It stays local and relaxed. Even the South Waterford aside plays like a small regional joke before the conversation closes with thanks to Colton and Mark Troyer.

As heard by us

A plainspoken look at how Erie-area farming turns land, timing, and risk into hard business.

Mark and Colton Troyer turn an agriculture discussion into a plainspoken look at rented land, drainage, tiling, and the risk of losing a season's inputs to flooding.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

You want the practical tradeoffs behind farming rented land near Erie.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

Listen to the show on

Apple Podcasts Spotify

Play clips from this episode More from TalkErie.com - The Joel Natalie Show - Erie Pennsylvania Daily Podcast