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RAPID RIVER -- It was an unlikely scenario:  a U.S. senator visiting a rural cattle farm.  But Senator Debbie Stabenow says it's how she does research for her position as Chair of the Senate Agriculture Committee.

"It's really important to me to be connecting directly with our farmers and our producers and see how things are working," says Stabenow (D-MI).

Stabenow talked to farm owner Len Gustafson about how, with the help of funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Gustafson's Farm has become a huge success.  The owners say that over the past five years, they've managed to grow their farm from about 10 cows to nearly 200 cows, and they now produce 80,000 pounds of beef a year.

Government funding covered 60 percent of an $80,000 project to improve their beef operation with fencing and a new water system.  Len says the more cows drink, the more they eat, and heavier cows make better meat.

"It's been a dry month.  The pastures are down; we couldn't have kept this many cattle without the program," says Gustafson.

Stabenow is working on a new farm bill to include plans to create a safety net for the risks involved in farming...including drought.

"We don't want any farmer losing their whole farm because of a few days of bad weather or because of something else they can't control," the Senator says.

Senator Stabenow says she'll take what she learned at Gustafson's Farm and apply it to the policies of the Senate Agricultural Committee.