Once-A-Day Milking

Even though I'm mostly interested in "None'ce-A-Day" milking (I don't really want to be a dairy farmer) I read the cover story of the February issue of "Graze" with great interest. The title of the article is, "The economics of once-a-day milking", and it deals with the experiences of veteran dairyman Cliff Hawbaker and his transition not only to once-a-day milking, but also a little bit of no-grain dairying. That is what I love about "Graze" so far ... they go straight to the source and it seems like the articles are just straight forward, "here is what is working and here is what isn't working," kind of stuff.

Like I said, I'm not really interested in running a dairy (or even having a milk cow at this time), but what I can respect and what I actually love to read about is someone who is going against the grain and against conventional wisdom. In a time when there are dairies moving to three-a-day milkings and souped up cows the fact that Mr. Hawbaker is transitioning to a seasonal, grass bassed, and once-a-day dairy farm is really against the grain.

But, from reading the article it doesn't seem that he is doing it because he has a deep desire to have grass only cattle or because he is trying to reach a specialty market. The reason that he has changed and is in the process of changing is because he wants to make better use of his time and resources so that he can make more money! I guess maybe bigger isn't always better. The other thing that Mr. Hawbaker said he liked about the seasonal/once-a-day milking is that he has time for family and his partners have time for family also. That isn't to say that they aren't plenty busy, but rather you can work your schedule a bit more when you only have to milk once.

Of course there were plenty of numbers and figures in the article that didn't make a lot of sense to this non-dairy guy, but between and around all of that there were some great insights on making the transition from conventional dairy to un-conventional dairy and all the while continuing to sell to the conventional market. It hasn't been easy for them and while he bought more land to begin an all new grass based herd he is also transitioning his old herd to the new system.

They have had trouble with dry weather and the lack of organic matter in their soil from the years of conventional farming, but even still he thinks this is the best fit for him and his farm. I love his attitude!

If you want to read a little bit about Mr. Hawbaker and his seasonal/once-a-day dairy farm I did find this online article. Any of you with dairy experience or thoughts want to comment on this?

So There is Money in Farming...

Yesterday I was looking for a new magazine to subscribe to because my subscription to "The Stockman Grassfarmer" had expired (great magazine, but I can only do one at a time so I wanted to try them all out). I just wanted to get a glimpse of what some of the articles were like in the various magazines out there for small scale farmers when I ran across an interesting article from "Graze". The title of the April 2008 article was, "From zero to $300,000 in five years". That caught my attention because I was under the impression that there was no money in farming, especially if you were starting with nothing.

Well, I don't have time to pontificate on the article too much, so I will encourage you to go and check it out. But, before I go I will leave you with a few thoughts of mine after reading through the article one time.

• Even though we bought land I do believe renting is one of the best ways to go if you can make it work for you. The reason we bought was because we were going to build our own house and spend about the same as a couple in our position would on a house in town.
• Having someone to help you get started is a wonderful thing. I haven't had the chance to have a mentor like I would have loved having, but the connections I have made through this blog and field days that I have attended have really been a help in planning.
• "Sweat-Equity" really does work. Just read the article to see what they were able to do.
• Record keeping, record keeping, record keeping! I love how detailed the information is in the article.

I believe this was a very encouraging article. There are plenty of risks to be hand in such a venture, but I think there are risks no matter what you do these days so you might as well enjoy your risks. If the rest of the articles are like this one I think I'll enjoy a year's subscription to "Graze". Do you have any other magazine suggestions before I pull the trigger?

Quality Pasture :: Chapter 10 Book Report

I just finished up reading chapter 10 of "Quality Pasture" by Allan Nation. This chapter was titled, "Seasonal Grass Dairying". I knew from the title that there wasn't going to be a lot of specific information in this chapter that would be useful for any operation that I was thinking about at the time, but it was still a good read. Dairying seems to a be an art, kind of like baling or just about all farming, that takes a good amount of knowledge about animals, health, forages, and more. I'm not about ready to tackle that right off (did you read my post about the farmer who hit the end), but I did find a lot of interesting nuggets in this chapter.

The most encouraging thing I read was the examples from real life farmers who are making grass based seasonal dairies work. So often when you mention some ideas you find from sources such as Joel Salatin, Allan Nation, the Stockman Grass Farmer, and other books/periodicals you get the standard Iowa farming tradition answer, "well, that won't work for you or here". But, this chapter proved that there are plenty of guys out there that are feeding forages for their main feed and running a seasonal dairy for a decent profit. Plus, the get the benefit of a few months off!

Another interesting thing is how America seems to be lagging behind in terms of thinking outside of the grain box (or should I say bushel basket). One interesting piece of information comes from Carl Pulvermacher a Holstein grazier from Wisconsin.

"He said his 68 acres of pasture land currently grosses #1430.70 per acre ($1305.20 from milk and $125.50 from meat) compared to only $402 from his corn ground (162 bushels at $2.50 - grain is higher now - per bushel)." -Quality Pasture by Allan Nation (pg. 186)

It seems like sometime our farmers would catch on to things like that ... but, maybe I'm just missing something? Please let me know if I am!

The last thing that I found really interesting in this chapter was a list of cost cutters for most dairy producers. While it is geared for the dairymen I thought it would be just as important for a beef cattle producer:

1. Get Your Breeding Season In Sync With the Pasture


2. Stop Grain Farming


3. Concentrate On Cutting Feed Costs


4. Minimize Machinery Costs


5. Increase Stocking Rate


6. Be Realistic About Animal Genetics


7. Don't Blame The Animals For Lack Of Profits


8. Change As Fast As Possible

If you have any thoughts on these things I would love to hear them!

Quality Pasture :: Chapter 5 Book Report

The title of this chapter is, "Quality Pasture For Warm-Temperate And Subtropical Climates". The title kind of sums up the lack of real practical application information I found in this chapter. I don' think you could call Southern Iowa "Warm-Temperate" or "Subtropical" unless you were comparing it to Northern Iowa!

But, there was still plenty of information for me in this chapter. One of the more interesting things that had me thinking was the section of this chapter that discussed the profitability of a seasonal dairy. This was interesting not because I'm interested in starting a seasonal dairy, but because the article that I linked to a few days ago about the farmer quitting mentioned that in order to survive you will need to have a year round dairy. Now, Allan Nation was speaking of seasonal dairies in the south and the author of the previous article was in the north, but it is still an interesting counterpoint. Most pastured dairy information I have read focused on the benefits and profitability of a seasonal dairy. I think the biggest problem with the farmer that was having to shut down is that he took himself so far into debt to get his operation up and running quickly. Maybe if he had taken more steps his end would not have come.

Much of the rest of the chapter deals with different pasture forages that can be used in the south for year round grazing, but it does emphasize that you will still need to have mechanically harvested forages even in the south. Even though the weather is warmer down there you still will have a fall slump before the winter cool season forages get going.

I am thoroughly enjoying this book mostly because it is increasing my knowledge (little by little) and it is giving me a sense of what is possible on a farm ... specifically on a smaller farm. I think there are great opportunities in Iowa for someone who is willing to study their pastures and and really become grass farmers instead of the old standard row crop farmers!

The next chapter is on pasture irrigation. It will be interesting to see what that is all about, but what I'm really looking forward to is chapter 7 about Management Intensive Grazing. Stay tuned!