(cow mooing) - [Narrator] It's estimated that 9% of US farmers are veterans.

Once defending it, now feeding it, many find that the steady schedule and physical stamina needed for farm work make it an easier switch during what can be a difficult time of transition.

Military veterans focused on sustainable and regenerative methods, like here at The Farm at Barefoot Bend, are a big bolster to the local food system, and it's amazing to see programs that help support it.

That's our focus in this "Good Roots."

(light music) (goat bleating) (light music) Located just outside of Benton in Lonsdale, The Farm at Barefoot Bend is owned and operated by former Army ranger, Damon Helton, and his family.

What may be most interesting about Damon's story is that before the military, he had never farmed before.

- (chuckling) We dabble in a little bit of everything, believe it or not, so I've got egg-layer chickens, I've got pigs, we do a pastured pig program, a grass-fed beef program.

(cow mooing) I've got a couple donkeys, got a couple horses, goats- (goat bleating) lambs, guineas.

Got a little bit of vegetables.

I had a midlife crisis, (chuckling) that's what I tell everybody, so.

I had five deployments between Iraq and Afghanistan, and when I got out, in my head I was just gonna go out and get the sales job, and just go make a whole bunch of money.

And I rapidly started to realize that that wasn't doing it for me.

I kind of had this empty spot, you know?

And so my wife and I were just taking a Sunday drive, and found this farm.

It was like, all right, well, let's buy this farm.

(laughing) She looked at me, she's like, "What are you talking about?

You want to put an offer in on a farm?"

And I was like, "Yeah, I wanna be a farmer."

So I quit my job that I had had for five years, a really good paying sales job, had a pretty healthy 401k for being out of the military for a short amount of time, cashed it all in, and bought a farm.

For the first few months, we didn't really know what we were doing, we were just kinda spinning.

And I looked at everything from row crops to tobacco.

(chuckling) And we started looking at this group, Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working Group.

That's where we found the program Armed To Farm, which is focused on veterans getting into agriculture.

That absolutely was instrumental in helping us get started.

- It's just like "Green Acres," he decided- (Damon laughing) to move out here.

- [Logan] As part of Senator Boozman's annual agricultural tour, he made a visit to a couple of Arkansas veteran farms.

- We've got a lot of veterans that are coming back and deciding what they want to do in the next phase of their life, and farming is something that appeals to a lot of them.

And the question is, how do you get into it?

It's kinda daunting.

It's not your area of expertise.

So Armed To Farm, programs like that really do an outstanding job of not only helping 'em get started, but these are programs that'll kinda hold their hands from then on.

I think that Armed To Farm will continue to expand.

Certainly, these are programs that myself and my situation, working with agriculture we're very interested in.

I'm certainly very concerned about suicide in the military, our veterans, and amongst those in the regular military.

(helicopter whirring) - Missions every night, it was just a lot.

What I didn't realize is the hole that it was gonna fill in me from not serving anymore.

Being able to fill that hole, fill that vacancy was huge.

- There are not enough services out there in the rural areas.

There are 13 community mental health centers in the state of Arkansas.

13, and there are 75 counties.

And that's not very many.

I've heard this many times, well, if they're talking about commit suicide, they're not gonna do it, are they?

They're just talking.

And that used to be sort of like an adage.

Well, if they talk about it, they're not gonna do it.

If they're talking about it, they're thinking about it, and if they're thinking about it, there's a possibility they're gonna do it.

They have to re-enter, not only the society as a whole, but they have to reenter their families, their relationships that have continued to develop as they've been gone.

Sometime there's guilt, there's remorse, post-traumatic stress disorder- (gun shooting) that so many of them come back with, and that's unpredictable, and oftentimes, we don't know what's gonna trigger it, but when it does, they go into full-blown trauma response.

It's just gonna take time, and it takes understanding, and a lot of patience on the people who are involved with the person returning to try to understand, he's not the same right now.

He may never be the same.

- One of the programs that we've advocated and worked really hard to create, which is just now getting off, is allowing the groups in the local communities that are doing a very, very good job in suicide prevention, giving them small grants so that they can be helpful, get involved, and then also steer them into the VA, besides providing the support that they can give.

- Damon, I know from, you know, my experience is not nearly as extreme as y'all's, but working EMS, you have bad calls, you're up all night.

You're doing stuff that nobody outside of your little world can understand, can relate to.

- It's easy for people to say, oh, well, I can understand what you're going through.

They don't.

They don't understand, but it's not because there's not a sense of empathy there or anything.

They just don't get it.

None of that's normal, right?

I mean, working an EMS call, or anything like that, or watching somebody get burned up with an IED, none of that's normal, right?

I mean, these aren't normal things.

PTSD is a real thing, and it can happen from a car accident, or losing a loved one, or anything like that.

- What was the biggest transition helper for you, and why is agriculture a part of that?

- I would say the first thing is finding that level of service again.

I had a purpose.

There was a nutritional aspect, too.

I was eating good.

I was feeding my family well.

I started sleeping better.

I mean, there was just all these things that started coming about because I had a better association with food.

Food security for my community.

Our farm is a small farm, but we produce a lot.

And so we can feed a good amount of people.

And I think that the more these local farms actually realize the big impact they can have, I think we're gonna start to see more of that, and hopefully we start to see more veterans getting involved in agriculture.

And I'm an Army guy, so not to steal the Marine Corps deal, but adapt and overcome.

That's a real military mindset.

And so I think it lends itself very well to farming, because you do have to adapt, and you do have to overcome.

And I mean, these animals are depending on us.

- I love it.

I love what y'all are doing.

Thank y'all for being an inspiration to so many other people looking for light in that darkness.

- There's light there.

That's all I can say to other veterans is there's light there, there's a purpose that you can find.

I didn't know that I was gonna find that purpose when I started down this road.

(light music) - Many veterans return home feeling lost and without hope.

Agriculture may be a new mission to transition back to civilian life.

For "Good Roots," I'm Logan Duvall.

- [Announcer] Major funding for "Good Roots" is provided by Arkansas Farm Bureau.

(soft music) - [Narrator] Arkansas Farm Bureau, advocating the interests of Arkansas's largest industry for more than 80 years.

Arkansas counts on agriculture.

Agriculture counts on Farm Bureau.