Our Trip to the Dairy Farm

My good friend Marie came up from Portland for a visit this weekend. We had pedicures and lunch out on Saturday, and when Jack woke up from his nap, we packed up the whole family and Marie in the Family Truckster and headed out to the country. Marie has a friend who runs a dairy farm with her husband about 45 minutes from our house, and she had invited us to come for a visit. We had a fantastic time! We had no idea our visit would be so fun and educational. Leann and Mike are two of the most gracious people I've ever met - they took 2 hours out of their day to show us around the dairy farm and explain how everything works. We asked a LOT of questions and Leann was happy to answer them all. It was a very impressive operation - almost 800 cows, mostly Holsteins and also a few Jerseys. They are in production 24/7/365 - which translates to a whole truckload (around 7,000 gallons!) of raw milk every day. Some interesting factoids that we picked up:

• A milk cow can have a career of 16 years or more
• Cows weigh about 125 pounds at birth.
• A cow produces on average 7-10 gallons of milk and per day.
• Cows like mariachi music. In fact, when these cows hear it playing in the milking room, they begin to "let down" their milk!
  
• For every gallon of milk they produce, they also produce 3 gallons of manure :-)
• Investing in the cows' comfort pays big dividends in higher milk production.
• Cows get 2 months paid sabbatical each year to graze and frolic (who says happy cows only live in California?)
• The two biggest times of year for milk demand are back to school time in the fall and the Superbowl (because of all the cheese consumed on pizza!)
• Cows don't have teeth in front on the top, instead they have a leather-like pad that enables them to grasp blades of grass with their bottom teeth.
  

Our kids were absolutely fascinated by the whole thing. Jack kept pointing and yelling streams of unintelligible "words" when he saw the cows, it was hilarious. I have to say, I have so much respect for the very hard work that is done by people like Leann and Mike to put milk on our table every day. As big consumers of milk (our kids drink about 1/2 gallon of whole milk every day) I really appreciate what they do. It is not an easy job or an easy lifestyle. So thank you to the dairy farmers of America!

The "ladies" lining up to be milked.

You have to imagine the mariachi music blaring to get the full picture in the milking parlor.

Check it out - a calf that had been born the very same day we were there!

The calves live in these interesting pods known as "igloos."
They seemed quite comfortable in there... plenty of room to move around and stand up or lie down.

We all got to experience a baby calf sucking on our fingers. Brooke and Jack were both brave and gave it a try!

Brooke was invited to "drive" the front loader and jumped at the chance!

That's my girl, piloting a $200,000 John Deere.
She kept raising and lowering the bucket as she and Mike tooled around the yard.

And they have a to-die-for view of Mount Rainier from the farm!

Thanks again, Mike and Leann! We really enjoyed our visit.