Forward Janesville - TheReport - Third Quarter 2023

too good to pass up. “It is not my land. It’s God’s land. I really think of myself as a caretaker for the time I am there. Not as having ownership or possessiveness,” MacFarlane said. MacFarlane and his team have started moving the farm to new land west of the original farm. The move, and new technology, are expected to support an additional half-a-million pheasants and partridges in future years, MacFarlane said. Looking back, the farm operated in one temporary brooding barn when MacFarlane came home in 1979. As he and his father planned the construction of a new permanent barn together, his father recommended they build the barn in a new spot. “He said no, you want it (the barn) up the hill because one day you might have four.” By 1986, a year after his father died, MacFarlane built the fourth brooding barn. Today, he has more than 40 acres of farmland and 2 million birds hatched each year. “My dad was far more forward thinking than I was. He had an idea the farmwould get bigger. I didn’t come home thinking that way,” MacFarlane said. MacFarlane describes himself as someone focused on the future who gave up working on the operations side of the business long ago. He feels a sense of gratitude to God, his parents, his family and his employees, even when his employees disagree with him on what they should name new bird pens. “We have these different pens and the guys put number one or two on it and I say ‘man can you get any more creative?’ …I wanted to name it the serendipity pen, but I got outvoted.” MacFarlane Snapshot • MacFarlane Pheasants, Inc., is the largest producer of pheasants in North America and has been in the game bird business since 1929. Pheasants were first brought to North America in 1773. ● In 2023, MacFarlane produced over 2 million day-old pheasant and partridge chicks. ● MacFarlane pheasants are raised in brooder barns until they are six weeks old. Then, they are moved to 180 acres of netted covered pens. ● MacFarlane raises a variety of pheasants including Chinese Ringneck Pheasants, Manchurian Ringneck Cross Pheasants, Kansas Pheasants, and Chukar. ● Adult pheasants and partridges are delivered to customers throughout the U.S. and Canada. Eggs are sold locally and many shipped to France. ● To learn more, visit MacFarlane Pheasants’ website at www.pheasant.com . Bill in the brooder barn. Don MacFarlane, one of the founders of the family business Bill MacFarlane, Owner MacFarlane Pheasants delivery truck circa 1940 www.forwardjanesville.com | 11