Posted on

From seasonal conventional to organic


Low-input dairy graziers make shifts for long-term sustainability and efficiency

By Martha Hoffman Kerestes


Belleville, Pennsylvania — After 30 years shipping conventional milk on a spring-seasonal schedule, the Bylers switched to the Organic Valley truck and moved to bi-seasonal calving. 

But that’s just one of many adjustments they’ve made over time to set the farm up for short- and long-term success.

Low-input management is the cornerstone, and that means outwintered herds, nurse cows, natural service, limited machinery, and more. Matt Byler, 53, and his son Garrett, 31, run the 250-cow dairy with a full-time DGA apprentice and a part-time employee. 

Cows doing the work

The Bylers manage around 750 rented and owned acres, although some are still in the process of organic transition. Their central Pennsylvania ground is relatively flat. The milking herd has access to the 320-acre home farm for year-round grazing, and there is off-farm acreage for young stock and dry cows.

All grain is purchased — the herd gets 10 lbs./head/day in the parlor. The pelleted mix is primarily ground corn and provides 20-25% of cows’ dry matter needs for the day. At times the herd gets some purchased corn silage too.

Continue reading “From seasonal conventional to organic”
Posted on

Working into grassfed dairy ownership


First-generation graziers find a future

By Martha Hoffman Kerestes


Garnavillo, Iowa — A few years ago, two young folks left existing careers in search of a more fulfilling life. Today, they’re married and building that fulfilling life together working into ownership on a dairy, as a longtime grazier passes the torch.

Nicole Blanchette, 30, grew up in suburbia and hadn’t been on a farm. She realized her post-college research job at a hospital wasn’t what she wanted to do for the rest of her life. 

The Covid-19 pandemic was the last straw — she wanted to be out of her downtown Chicago apartment. She thought, “I like being outside, I love food, and I love animals, so maybe I should try farming.”

That led Nicole to Cliff McConville’s All Grass Farms not far away, and she joined the operation as a Dairy Grazing Apprentice through DGA. There, she fell in love with dairy and realized this was what she wanted to do with the rest of her life.

She was about to graduate when she met Paul Blanchette, 37, but they almost didn’t cross paths.

Continue reading “Working into grassfed dairy ownership”
Posted on

A growing herdshare business


Nurse cows and tall grazing help make the system work smoothly for the Bairs


By Martha Hoffman Kerestes


Troy, Ohio — Two dozen years after first turning their conventional herd out to pasture, David and Annette Bair are bringing on the next generation, milking 48 cows for one of the largest herdshare programs in Ohio, and eyeing more growth as demand continues to expand.

It’s a long way down the road from where things were at when David got fed up harvesting feed for the confinement dairy around the turn of the century. He was moving from 3rd and 4th cut hay straight into corn silage and then directly into high moisture ear corn, and it was a lot of time to spend on the tractor.

“I was spending every day for 90 days that the weather was fit in the tractor chopping, and it was costing a lot of money to do that,” David says. “I just thought we could do better if we could just send the cows out and harvest their own feed.”

When he pitched the idea of letting the cows out to graze, his dad was hesitant but willing to try.

“My dad’s biggest fear was ‘what if it turns dry?’,” David explains. “He was worried pasture wouldn’t be able to keep supplying forage if it turned dry.”

David seeded 25 acres and grazed the herd in 2001 for part of their ration. And one part of his father’s fear came true as the season turned dry, but the pasture didn’t fail them.

Continue reading “A growing herdshare business”
Posted on

Raising triplet lambs on pasture


Using management and selection to make triplets an asset in grassfed production

By Janet McNally


Triplets have never been regarded as an asset in an all-grass system. I have within my flock a line of ewes with the prolific booroola, or B, gene. This is a line of sheep I started before I switched to grazing. 

A ewe with one copy of the B gene typically gives birth to 2.47 to 2.78 lambs. Suffice to say I have had to address how to raise triplets in the context of a grass-based system.

Over time my method of raising triplets has evolved. 

Barn-feeding bust

Initially only one in three ewes had enough milk to feed all three lambs. 

So I did what everyone does. I pulled the third lamb off, raised it in the barn on milk replacer and creep feed, then returned it to pasture after weaning. 

They invariably crashed no matter how good they looked at weaning. The weight loss was inevitable, and they would not recover by market time.

Continue reading “Raising triplet lambs on pasture”
Posted on

Pushing the boundaries of grazing


Grazing 300-plus days a year in the north

By Martha Hoffman Kerestes


Loganville, Wisconsin — Darren Yanke and his family graze a grassfed beef herd in the hills of southwestern Wisconsin, and one of the farm’s aims is to feed as little hay as possible.

“My goal is to graze for 360 days a year,” Darren says. “I’m not sure if it’s gonna happen or not.” 

Last year was the first 300-day grazing season, and he thinks there’s plenty of upward possibility. Darren guesses that 330 days of grazing would be a reasonable average, since this part of the country usually has a month sometime in the winter where things are iced over and grazing isn’t very feasible. Snowfall is usually moderate and the cows graze through the snow without issues.

Most people in his area feed hay for five or six months over the winter. Darren wants to use the money saved on hay for other pasture expenses including more winter watering spots so more parts of the farm are available for stockpile grazing.

Finding the limits of grazing days per year is just one way the Yankes are experimenting with the grazing operation to find new practices that work for the farm.

“We’re pushing the boundaries all the time,” he says. “I don’t want to be traditional. I want to keep pushing forward, doing what other people aren’t doing, staying in front of the curve.”

Continue reading “Pushing the boundaries of grazing”
Posted on

Building a first-generation dairy


Shipping milk and making cheese are a winning combination for the Webbs

By Martha Hoffman Kerestes


Enosburg Falls, Vermont — Tyler and Melanie Webb are first-generation dairy farmers. In fact, Tyler hadn’t ever milked a cow when his herd started calving, so he had to ask a neighbor to come over and show him how to use the milker.

But almost two decades into dairying, they are seasoned graziers with a spring-seasonal herd, an Organic Valley market, and an artisan cheese business.

The Webbs steward around 400 acres, with 275 owned and the rest rented. There are 160 acres of pasture and 120 acres for perennial stored forage, and the rest of the land is managed woodland or set aside for riparian, wildlife, and pollinator habitat. There are 70 milking cows here on the farm in northwestern Vermont.

“Efficient grazing machines”

The farm consists of mostly silt loams. Rocks abound (hence the name Stony Pond Farm), so sward change happens through frost seeding improved red and white clovers, not tillage and reseeding. Management is part of it too.

“Our main route for improving pastures is through stocking density and frequency of moves,” Tyler explains.

Continue reading “Building a first-generation dairy”