Gary N. Porter and Lori Porter v. Richard L. Harden and Janice Harden

MANSFIELD, Justice.

This case requires us to determine whether a tenant’s decision to graze a single horse on the property where the tenant resides is enough to establish a farm tenancy and trigger the special termination protections of Iowa Code sections 562.5 through 562.7. Reading the statute as a whole, we conclude that land which is not devoted primarily to the production of crops or the care and feeding of livestock cannot be the foundation for a chapter 562 farm tenancy. Therefore, we affirm the judgment of the district court and vacate the decision of the court of appeals.

I. Background…