Organic Dairy Farming

Long time no post, so I figured somebody had to do it. As part of my plant pathology field identification class we visited an organic dairy farm today. It was a pretty cool experience, they produce milk under the Organic Valley trade name. What I was most impressed with was their milking set up. They have about a 1,000 acre farm, which includes about 250 acres for the cows to graze and the rest is for producing certified organic feed for the animals. I included a little video of the milking operations because I thought it was super sweet. They have about 325 cows that get milked twice a day, each milking only takes 2.5 hrs with their sweet set up. Check out this video to see more.

After leaving the farm I was seriously thinking about buying their milk, sort of nice to know where your food comes from. On our field trip we also visited an organic vegetable farm, called the JehnEhr Family Farm, in Sun Prairie. They have a program called a CSA, which stands for Community Supported Agriculture. Basically it is a program that allows consumers to buy fresh organic produce directly from the farmer. For about $20 a week you get a large box of produce, the catch is that you don't have a choice of what vegetables and fruits will be in it, you just get whatever is ripe and in season. It seems like an interesting idea and I think Anthony and I are going to give it a try. You can read more about it on the JehnEhr website.

All for now, keep the blogging comming. --Jon