5/16/2023 0 Comments Ricks hobby farm![]() Over the years, Field has served as an expert witness in more than 100 lawsuits that included the deaths of a surgeon, an FBI agent, a lawyer and several other professionals who traded white-collar careers for farming. Those deaths - nearly 30 between 20 - represent a disproportionately high percentage of Indiana's total farming deaths, given the state's widespread commercial farming operations, Field said. Up to a quarter of Indiana's 115 farm fatalities over the past four years have been on small operations that include so-called hobby or lifestyle farms, which are often run by people who entered farming from other lines of work, according to research by Purdue University farm-safety expert Bill Field, who has tracked farm fatalities for nearly four decades. Experts say some novices have little appreciation of the occupation's dangers. But the nation's growing embrace of small-scale production of local and organic crops is drawing more amateurs into the field, and inexperienced growers are increasingly getting maimed and even killed, often by old, unsafe machinery. The risk of serious injury or death has always been a part of farming. "If he had any time off, we went to the farm." "The farm was a very important part of my husband's life," said Jacobs' widow, Joyce. The tractor, which dated to the early 1960s, had no rollover protections. ![]() The Lawrenceburg, Indiana, anesthesiologist was removing dying ash trees in June 2015 when his tractor overturned as he was pulling a tree up a hill. Decades later, he still spent time there, maintaining the property as a second job and using its campsite for family getaways. INDIANAPOLIS - Phil Jacobs was just a teenager when his parents bought a scenic Kentucky farm with hayfields, forests, creeks, trails and a view of the Ohio River.
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