The colony divides before it grows large enough to be impersonal.
At about 150 people a colony branches: the land is bought, the buildings built, the families sorted into two lists, and which list goes is decided by lot on the day. Both halves are meant to be viable, and the parent colony pays for the daughter.
Branching keeps the colony at a size where informal control still works: everyone can be known, watched and reasoned with, and no bureaucracy is needed. The mechanics are demanding — the daughter colony must be bought and built before the split, so the parent carries the debt — and the human cost is real, because families are divided across the two lists. The list that goes is usually decided by lot on the day so that neither group can be accused of choosing the better land. It is also why Hutterite growth appears in the landscape rather than in a membership roll: the population rose from about 443 colonies in 2009 to 544 in 2024, and the colonies keep moving outward from Alberta, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and the northern American plains.
The same ground, other faiths
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