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What one local dietitian learned on a recent (and first) dairy farm visit.

by: Kary Woodruff MS, RD, CSSD

Cheese Tasting at Heber Valley Cheese (Canyon View Farms)

I recently had the fortunate opportunity to take a tour of some of Utah’s dairy farms – an experience more insightful than I had anticipated.  I am not sure what I expected – perhaps to see some cows being milked and several large vats of milk? But this isn’t what I saw. Instead, I witnessed and experienced a way of life. 

For generations, these dairy farm families have poured their hearts and souls into what they produce – dairy – a product that not only sustains them economically, but a product that provides quality nourishment for all of us.

If I had to find one word to describe the feeling I got from these farms it would be pride.  All the farmers we meet took time from their incredibly full days to show us their livelihood.  It quickly became apparent that this was more than just a way of making a living. Though, like many industries, the economic situation for dairy farmers has been bleak these past few years, I saw passion in these families.  For them, dairy farming not only seemed to be something they did, it seemed a part of who they are. They believe in what they do and they stand behind their products.

Calf Hutches at Bateman Mosida Farms

My appreciation for dairy products deepened through this process.  The milk produced on these farms came from cows that are treated humanely and respectfully.  They get fresh air daily and are not crammed in the tight quarters I imagined them to be.  Nor are they pumped with high doses of hormones and antibiotics as we are lead to believe from the media.  These are cows doing what their bodies are designed to do in a safe and ethical manner. My experience revealed quite plainly that quality dairy is being produced from quality ingredients.

Time for Milking! Bateman Mosida Farms

I went home that night and enjoyed my glass of milk more than I ever had.  I had a much deeper respect for the process that brought this carton from the dairy farm up the road to my own refrigerator.  If you ever get an opportunity such as this I recommend you take it! You sure won’t take your dairy foods for granted!

Kary Woodruff is the sport dietitian at The Orthopedic Specialty Hospital in Murray, UT.

If you are interested in visiting a dairy farm and learning a bit more about what local farming is all about, please contact us!

By Guest Blogger Braden Anderson

Last year I was able to go to the World Dairy Expo in Madison, WI and it was one of the most incredible trips I have ever experienced! Each May at the Richmond Black and White Days (an annual dairy show in Richmond, UT) one free trip to the World Dairy Expo is awarded.

The World Dairy Expo

To win the trip I had to enter a contest in which I had to respond to a general dairy knowledge questionnaire and sit for an interview with the selection committee. I supplied answers to a range of questions about the dairy industry and dairy farming that included everything from dairy management and financial issues, to animal care, nutrition, and herd health. I was then interviewed by a panel of experts. 

I was fortunate enough to emerge last year’s winner, and my trip to Wisconsin was absolutely incredible. I spent time looking at all of the beautiful cows, new farm equipment, and innovative dairy technology like robotic milkers. In my opinion, everybody needs to go to the Expo at least once. I have been twice now, and I want to go again this year – it’s tons of fun! Though I am not eligible to win Richmond’s Black & White Days contest again, I can still enter and win money for college – that’s my plan.

Previous Posts by Braden: Why I Want to Stay on the Farm

On a chilly morning in February, Chace Fullmer’s cell phone rang. It was one of his employees, calling from the maternity pen, and his voice was urgent with excitement.  Chace rushed over to the maternity area to find that one of their cows had just delivered healthy triplets.

Triplets at Cedar Ridge Dairy

On a dairy farm, twins are not uncommon, but to have healthy triplets is a rare event. Chace’s father and the dairy’s herdsman have over 100 years of combined experience on the farm and neither of them had ever seen anything like this. Tyler Sorensen is the veterinarian at Cedar Ridge Dairy. While he has seen triplets born a few times in his life, this is only the second set of live triplets he has ever experienced. He says, “The odds of triplets being born is about 1 in 105,000 births and only 25% of those are born alive. To get 3 live triplets equates to about a 1 in 420,000 chance or almost one in half a million. The average twinning rate in holstein cattle is about 2.4% of all births. While twins and triplets are unique and fun to observe, there are many risk factors that can be associated with multiple births (increased risk of abortion, stillbirth, decreased birth weight, and neonatal sickness).” Last month’s event at Cedar Ridge was quite remarkable! The holstein mother delivered 3 healthy babies, each weighing about 60 lbs, without any assistance. The calves are now about one month old and doing quite well.

Baby’s first steps

Chace has always loved dairy farming and the maternity area is his passion (See Calves…They’re Why I Live On the Dairy)

Just like her dad, Chace’s daughter loves the little ones!

From Guest Blogger, Val Christoph

Adventures in Israel

Emily at Mt. of Olives

This semester our youngest daughter, Emily, is studying in Israel. The Master’s College  she (and our oldest daughter) attend, has a bible extension in Israel called IBEX (Israel Bible Extension), located between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Though as a mom, I am concerned about her being so far from home, I’m not to worry because their lounge is the bomb shelter!!!  (This is what she tells me!)

She is having a great time learning about the culture and actually seeing and walking the lands of the Bible.  Because most Israeli women have dark hair, our daughter fits in and many people, mistaking her for a local, even try to speak to her in Hebrew!  She is taking Hebrew language classes, but she is not fluent by any means. One of her friends is blonde (she doesn’t blend in quite as well) and someone offered her 5 camels to be his wife (he was very serious)!!  After hearing this story, we were teasing our son that perhaps he should offer 5 jersey cows to his future wife!!!!

Annelise & Emily

So while we are here on the farm, still milking, feeding and spring calving, Emily is off in Israel having the adventure of a lifetime!

An Adventure of a Lifetime

From Guest Blogger, Robyn Buttars

When the weatherman in Salt Lake City warned it could be as low as 1°F and called it a “very cold” morning, I realized it would take a long list of adjectives to describe the projected -20°F  on our dairy, one hundred miles to the north. At 5:00 a.m., when my husband, Kent, went to chore the expected low was accurate.

-20 Degrees in Lewiston, UT

I snuggled down in my warm bed hoping the water lines at the barn had not frozen during the night.  Then I worried about the trucks and tractors. Would they start so the cows could be fed?

At quarter to seven, Kent ran into the house to shower, shave and dress in his suit for a 7:00 a.m. church meeting. Everything must have worked, I thought. Then he told me when he went to feed the heifers, the gate to the corral was wide open. Chasing heifers around the field, through a foot of snow, is a dismal task when it is 20° F. But when the temperature is -20°F? Well, you get the picture.

“How long did it take to get the heifers back in the corral?” I asked sympathetically.

“It was so strange,” Kent said. “One heifer was standing in the open gate and another a few feet away in the manger. I walked up to them and they went willingly into the corral. I searched but couldn’t find more heifers even though there were a lot of hoof prints in the field.  They must have run around during the night then gone back in the corral on their own.” He shook his head and shrugged his shoulders. “I’ve never seen anything like that.”

I was grateful for our warm home that morning and that Kent had a reprieve from a disagreeable chore. I couldn’t help wonder what motivated the heifers to leave the freedom of a -20° romp for the confines of their corral. How long had they stayed restrained behind an open gate?  I finally concluded that whatever the reason for their unusual behavior, they picked a good time to show a little uncommon cow sense.

Despite frigid temps, the landscape in Northern Utah is still quite beautiful

Read more from Country Fiction Author, Robyn Buttars, on her blog: robynbuttars.blogspot.com

Meet the most recent addition to our Cow Locale Blogger Community: Braden Anderson is dairy farming’s next generation.

“For as long as I can remember, I have always wanted to be around cattle, and that is why I want to stay on the farm.”  - Braden Anderson

Braden Anderson has spent the entirety of his 18-years on his family’s dairy farm in Newton, UT, and he is looking forward to continuing his life as the 4th generation to own, operate, and manage the dairy. Just finishing up high school, Braden has grown up in a world in which careers in agriculture have diminished. Just 2% of the American population is involved with agriculture, and while he has grown up in a farming community, he has watched neighbors, friends, and family have to leave the industry in search of alternative job opportunities. Making your way as a dairy farmer can be tough work. Even in his youth, Braden recognizes that “one of the toughest parts is that you never know how much money you will get for your milk.”

But the good things and the promise of his ideal lifestyle have led him to pursue his dream. Here’s why Braden wants to stay on the farm…

• I enjoy working with dairy cows and heifers.
• I enjoy watching young calves grow into mature milk cows.
• I love being outside in the country.
• I like working with family.
• I enjoy working with show cattle and competing against other farms.
• I enjoy working to improve our herd.
• I enjoy associating with other dairymen and people that work with the farmers.
• I enjoy driving tractors and operating farm equipment.
• There is nothing better than getting out to farm the land at first light and watching the sun go down in the evening.
• I find it satisfying to learn how to fix farm equipment.
• I enjoy producing milk, which is nature’s most perfect food (Ice cream!!)

For me, there is nothing better than having fun and working on the family farm.

In 2013, Rosehill Dairy was looking to do something different. Specializing in the dairy home-delivery market, several customers had inquired about the existing reusable bottles – were they BPA free? Intrigued by the possibilities, Rosehill began looking for vendors and set out to design a new BPA-free, reusable bottle for their home delivery business that would not only work well in the processing plant (cleaning, filling, sealing) but would also be ideal for customers.

Rosehill’s new bottles are BPA Free!

In December, after retrofitting machines, designing new caps and labels, and taking order on the bottles, Rosehill incorporated the new bottles into production. So far, customer response and satisfaction has been great. Caps are easier to open, the handle makes the bottles easier to hold and handle, and pouring from the new bottles is a breeze. Customers also love that not only does their milk taste great and come fresh from the farm, but it now comes in BPA-free, reusable, customized bottles.

If you live in Northern Utah (Cache, Box Elder, Davis, Morgan, and Weber counties), consider signing up for Rosehill home delivery and have weekly orders of milk, cheese, and specialty products arrive fresh at your doorstep. For those who don’t live in these northern Utah counties, look for Rosehill products at an increasing number of your favorite restaurants, coffee shops, and specialty markets.

New bottles fit neatly into standard milk crates

Learn more about Rosehill Dairy in a previous Cow Locale post: Rosehill Dairy Delivers – Just Like the Good ‘Ol Days, and check them out on Facebook.

From Guest Blogger Lacey Papageorge

Congratulations are in order for Lacey who was just named one of our 2013 Utah Dairy Ambassadors!

Just like a baby humans, baby cows (called calves) drink from a bottle to get their food. It is important that in the first 24 hours of life the calves must drink colostrum. Colostrum is the first milk produced by the mother cow. The final 30 days that the cow is pregnant, she is working to produce colostrum, which is full of antibodies for her calf. Calves are born with no immunity. They need to consume colostrum so they are less vulnerable to disease.

An early morning (chilly) calf feeding

For the first few weeks of a calf’s life, it is fed out of a huge bottle. We measure out how much milk each calf will get each time we feed to be sure that each calf gets enough to drink. While bottle feeding, it is important to be very patient, especially if the calf is very young and new to bottle feeding. Calves are strong so, you must hold on to the bottle tight! When the milk starts to run low, the calves often will nudge you. This is caused by instincts to nudge their mother’s udder to induce milk let down. Once a calf is older, they will begin to drink out of a bucket.

Feeding calves is fun, but you cannot do it without getting milk and some slobber on you. Like doctors, we wear rubber gloves, when bottle feeding so that it is not as cold when our hands get wet. The calves are feed milk twice per day – once in the morning and once at night. They also have a grain feeder, so they can snack on grain as they please. After they are six weeks old, they are weaned (taken off milk). The calves are then given hay and grain.

Measuring for calf bottles

For the past three weeks, Northern Nevada and Utah have seen extremely cold temperatures. Here’s an example: Utah’s Cache Valley is home to a large percentage of the state’s dairy farms, and morning temperatures have routinely been -10 degrees with daytime highs barely creeping into the single digits. For insight into how dairy cattle deal with such temperature extremes, we turned to  the experts – our local dairy farmers and one of our local large-animal dairy veterinarians and asked, “Do Cows get Cold?”

Tyler Sorensen

Tyler Sorensen, a veterinarian in central Utah says, “Yes, just as cattle suffer from heat stress, they can also suffer from cold stress. While cows naturally make seasonal adaptations to deal with changing temperatures, one of the most important things we, as animal stewards, can do is to keep cattle in good body condition by providing additional food as well as areas such as barns and wind breaks.”

Sorensen notes that cows acclimate to cold weather by growing a longer winter coat, “This does a lot to keep a cow comfortable in cold conditions. This adaptation can be negated, however, if the hair becomes wet, matted, or laden with manure, so dairy farmers work hard to keep their cows clean and dry,” he says.

Look closely to see slightly longer hair on these dairy cattle at Barex Dairy in central, UT

Cows in good body condition tend to handle cold temperature extremes better. “Cows will naturally build up fat stores, which offer insulation.” Sorensen says, “During cold weather, cows burn these fat reserves – if not kept up, they can compromise their body condition.” To keep their cattle in optimal shape, dairy farmers work with animal nutritionists and veterinarians to consider increasing food intake or offering their cattle a winter food ration that is more energy-dense than their typical meal.

Kyle Anderson, a dairy farmer in Newton, UT worries most about his calves during periods of sustained cold weather. With few fat reserves and limited time to adapt, younger animals may have a more difficult time weathering consistently cold temperatures. He, like other Utah and Nevada farmers use lamps, blankets and wind breaks to keep calves as healthy and comfortable as possible.

An enclosed calf barn in Coalville, UT. The sides of the barn can be raised in warmer weather.

Calf blankets are used to help protect young animals from extreme cold. Without fat reserves and shorter hair, calves are more susceptible to the stresses of cold weather.

Heat lamps may also be used to keep cows comfortable in cold temperatures.

“When cattle experience cold stress, everything suffers,” says Sorensen, “milk production decreases, reproduction takes a back seat, and the general health of the cow is at stake. There are steps we can and do take to minimize this and keep our cattle as healthy and comfortable as possible all year long.”

Like people, cows notice this chilly weather, but dairy farmers and veterinarians are constantly monitoring their herds to keep them as comfortable, warm, and safe as possible.

From Guest Blogger – Ellissa Clark

Mom milks cows on Christmas!

This Christmas something happened that I had never seen before in my entire life. My mom milked cows! It has been an ongoing ‘tradition’ in our family that as the Clark kids, we milk the cows on Christmas morning. Every year my older brother and I would be awakened at 4:30 by our mom, who would attempt to make it seem like heading to the farm on Christmas morning to milk cows would be a great adventure. As an 8 year old it was hard, and as I grew older I learned it never would get easier, but this year was different. This Christmas my parents volunteered to milk the cows on Christmas morning. I was pretty excited. I could finally have the Christmas morning that I had been dreaming about since I was 8. Yet, as Christmas morning came I didn’t feel like I had expected to. It didn’t seem like Christmas morning without being at the farm. So my sisters and I piled in the truck and headed down to the farm to feed the calves. Now that the whole family was at the farm, it felt more like Christmas. I have learned that Christmas isn’t about opening presents early in the morning or about milking cows. Christmas is about spending time with your family and those you love, whether you are spending Christmas at home or spending Christmas in a milk barn.

Click here to read more about Ellissa’s experiences on the farm at Christmas.