Fourth-generation farmer continues family’s tradition in Appling Co.

APPLING COUNTY, Ga. (WTOC) - March is National Peanut Month and preparation is already underway to get this year’s batch in the ground.

A fourth-generation farmer in Appling County is carrying on his family’s tradition within their community.

“I think it is a good, honest way to make a living. Something you can do and put your hands on and be proud of,” said Jonathan Mann.

Mann farms over 2,000 acres of land with his father and brother-in-law in Appling County, Ga. Land that has been in his family for his entire life.

“Farming is what I have grown up seeing. My mother’s father farmed, my daddy’s father farmed, their fathers farmed. In a big way, it is all I have ever seen, so I am just proud to be able to do what those that came before me did,” said Mann.

Throughout the year, Jonathan grows cotton, pecans and even raises chickens. But as for this time of the year, it is all about peanuts.

Although there aren’t peanuts in the ground yet, in a matter of weeks about 800 acres will be planted on Jonathan’s farm.

Those peanuts will go on to do more than feed people at the end of the year, they’ll help sustain jobs within the community throughout the spring and summer.

“We buy tires for peanuts trailers; we buy equipment to harvest these peanuts and that puts jobs in the local economy. It’s not just for farmers, I believe it is a good, stable and robust enterprise for our community.”

At the end of the season the peanuts stay local. From the ground they go to a buying point in Surrency, where they are stored before being taken to a peanut sheller.

From planting to harvesting and selling, it is a cycle that Jonathan’s kids have been around their entire lives. One that he hopes he can pass along down the road when the time is right.

“As a fourth-generation farmer, I absolutely want to make it a fifth-generation farm. I would say the majority of what I do, the things I think about during the day are kind of geared toward that. “I have two sons and a daughter, and I hope between the three of them that somebody comes back to the farm and somebody will carry this on.”

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