Ryan and Hope Pjesky, the Goltry, Oklahoma, farmers featured in the mid-March Farmers for the Future profile, face the same challenges as other young farmers. Here's what they had to say about some questions young farmers ask these days.

It's true that growing your farm by renting or buying more land can help you increase economies of scale.

Still, watch the price you pay. "If you can't afford it and it takes profit away from the rest of your operation to pay for it, it doesnt make any sense," says Ryan Pjesky.

The Pjeskys aren't averse to expanding their stocker cattle and winter wheat operation by buying more land. "If the right situation presented itself, we wouldn't turn it down," he says. "I'd like to see land prices soften a bit, though. Land prices right now are unreasonably high. It makes no sense to buy land at the peak.

"When I make a decision like buying land, I always ask myself, 'Is it going to jeopardize something my dad, grandfather and great grandfather built?'" says Ryan.

Ryan and Hope face a different market environment than when Ryan's father, Roger, began farming 40 years ago.

"If wheat prices changed 30 to 40 cents a bushel in a year, that was a lot of change," says Ryan. "And it was really big news if it changed 70 to 80 cents in a year. Price swings like that can now occur within a day. Prices for inputs like fertilizer also are volatile. Prior to 2009, it was cheaper most of the time to buy fertilizer in advance of the next year. Not so this year."

One way the Pjeskys are coping with price volatility is delaying buying fertilizer. "I don't know how smart it is to buy ahead of time anymore," says Ryan. "For anhydrous ammonia, we're looking at it being $500 (per ton) less than it was in 2008."