Presenting the Trautman Family Dairy
FEATURING:
- 100% Grass Dairy -- NO GRAIN of any sort
- Certified organic herd, Jersey crosses
- Once a day milking
- Calf on cow: Calves stay with mama for about 8 weeks and are then weaned.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Some figures which will demonstrate how unique our farm is:
To our consumer friends: The healthful benefits of 100% grass milk are becoming clear, as science catches up. Milk is not a simple substance. Milk is not Milk under any circumstances. Absolutely feeding grain to cows "pays" on the milk check - but we believe long term costs that are 'arguable' end up making grain feeding not pay.
Our core belief with our dairy and beef -- is that cows are ruminants, that they are uniquely, and perfectly, designed to process forage, and that if the thought and energy is put towards perfecting the forage and the management system around forage, ultimate value will be found, for farmers and consumers when they have all the knowledge about the value of all grass milk.
Balancing energy would be so much simpler if we would just pour the grain to our cows. But we won't; we have the discipline to find the pectins, the sugars in high quality grasses to balance the proteins. The most important & time consuming factor, re-igniting the fertility of our soil, has been done. We have diverse beautiful pastures and we make beautiful all grass milk.
And why bother with 100% grass diet, anyway? Fantastic benefits await you, the consumer. Here is one short article http://www.eatwild.com/articles/superhealthy.html
Questions about our 100% grass milk? Email us: family@trautman.net
To my fellow dairy farmers: There are 1.25 million dairy cows on 13,000 dairy operations in Wisconsin at this time. That's an average of 90 cows per farm; considering I estimate there are only 10 farms in Wisconsin doing 100% grass, that's 900 cows. That would be two decimal places short of 1%. THAT is "trivial". Then add our OAD (Once A Day milking) and Calf on Cow practices, there are NO farms in Wisconsin that combine all three practices. So we are absolutely simple to marginalize; feel free to do so, you will be in fine company. To know, however, that what we are doing is working, and to see the health of our animals, the vitality of our farm - and our happiness - you may want to consider whether cows eating forage -- ruminants eating forage 100%, is the marginal activity you need to believe it is. But understand that we have created the situation where all this works.
Updates
January 2010: We made some changes to our calf weaning: weaned a group right next to the cows. Although the bellering may have lasted a bit longer, the group has shown itself to be better growing than the group taken away. Next year, we hope to nose wean - put a device in the nose to keep the calf from nursing, but NOT remove from mom/herd. My thoughts continue towards creating a situation where we never violate the herd. Cows are herd animals, changing the herd causes stress. Humility in all things.
December 2009: What great cows, great health, great milk. Our latest DHIA testing: about 3/4rs of our girls are below 70,000 SCC -- where 100,000 is considered 'perfect' udder health. And the other 1/4-- usually just one high quarter. Like everyone, we've got a couple like that that refuse to behave. But they don't get worse, either. A great group of cows. Funny, how we've been told over and again: Once a day milking, you're not going to be able to control somatic cell. Huh. Guess that and --- everything else -- the conventional wisdom says -- is to be questioned.
Keeping condition -- even though we are feeding for economy now (nothing but 1st crop hay for last month) -- is a testament yet again to the fertility plan and getting great nutrition in our high quality forages. Did a decent -- not yet perfect -- but better -- job of harvesting and storing forages this year. The fertility plan gives us some forgiveness in that harvest & storage, in addition to wonderful nutrient availability.
We in the all have a very happy operation: quite simple in our feeding, handling; we get so very much enjoyment from what we are doing.
Calves: 17 beautiful heifers, 8 beautiful bulls. All now weaned and doing great. Bound for greatness!
2nd season now with no freshening problems. No ketosis, no milk fever, no laminitis, no DA's, no nothing. Drop 'em on the ground and get to work making milk. Any wonder we are so enthusiastic? So very little time spent on distractions. Nothing invested in all the crap agribusiness would have you buy .(a trip through World Dairy Expo for us: Very satisfying: Don't need it, Don't need it, Don't need it. Repeat through the entire building). The only thing I DID need is that LIC New Zealand grass genetics....for whom they even have a metric for...once a day milking! Yes, there is heritability in doing well in an OAD environment.
August 2009: Another season of a nice tight calving window, healthy calves & moms. Only issues we're having are some high cell counts on a few quarters, otherwise the cows have done and continue to do all the hard work. We've had an amazing run of heifers -- ALL of our best cows gave us heifers this year, wow! 2-1 heifers to bulls. Amazing.
August 20, 2009: One cow left to freshen is all; tally is: 15 heifers, 8 bulls. That's grand luck for us.
March 2009: EVERYONE will be a whole lot happier when we get back to grass. Human and bovine alike. We're getting there. As usual we've learned a lot from our first winter with the girls.
January 2009
Butterfat 4.6%, Protein 3.5%. The cows are weathering the winter well, the bedding pack continues to build, and all are itching for better weather and grass season. For my part I continue to learn more and plan for the 2009 season. Energy is the limiting factor in our - or really any dairy operation generally, and definitely in any all grass operation; and without grain, it's sugars and pectins from forage that bring that energy. I find myself having to sift through a lot of what I believe to be "wrong thinking" and get what I can from the fundamental truths of the knowledge that's out there.
With our limited feeding infrastructure -- a fixit guy like me goes a little crazy that I can't do what I'd like to do. I have various feeds I'd like to put in a vertical mixer and make that perfect feed, balance of protein and energy, legumes and grasses, fermented hay and dry hay. But that's not my reality. There are things we can and will want to do to hold the cows off their favorite food (high protein oats+peas baleage) and their least favorite (what I would think is a very tasty nice dry grassy hay). In addition, with the oats+peas baleage, it was harvested late, so the oats are more like straw -- and the cows are doing some sorting, eating the peas, leaving the oats straw for later, exacerbating the excess protein problem. IF to mix that up, well then, no sorting.
Highly mineralized forages -- is the result of our aggressive soil remineralization and organic matter building program since 2003. Even though I'm frustrated at times with my ability to --consistently-- make great hay, the minerals are there and we've had excellent health. I resolve in 2009 to make perfect hay, as I do every year! But as usual, I do make progress each year and have plans on how to do better.
November 1 2008
We've been collecting data & making adjustments and working through issues since the cows freshened in July. It is going well; about where I expected things to be. Healthy cows, beautiful milk but not all the volume I'd like. Some data:
REMEMBER: 85% of our cows are 1st lactation, still growing girls.
Averages as of late October: SCC: 155,000 Butterfat: 4.4 Protein: 3.25
Production average: ~20lbs/cow/day (once a day milking)
That includes: 22% still with calves, 3/4 of them getting quite big, lowest milk
being only 4lbs/day
Top 25% averaging 29lbs, 2nd 25% 22lbs
MUN (Milk Urea Nitrogen) values 18-20; struggling to keep them down with the high protein pastures. We have to force them to eat good grassy dry hay when they really want that tasty pasture. They should be in the range of 10-15. This is where feeding some grain would bring that right down...bring components and volume up! We do know what we'd like to do in the future; have some SorghumSudan grass baleage to feed, but our reality is not that right now.
October 2008: One last heifer to freshen, which will be any time now. We are milking 22. Our run of bull calves was long -- only 4 heifers out of 16 live calves. It was in August that we got our dairy finished, and we are pleased to be milking in the state of the art, assuming you are in about 1975. Kidding, quite nice facilities to milk in.
We have now weaned our first group of 12 calves, having fed them no grain whatsoever, they are doing alright. At about 2 weeks weaned we were a little worried, with them getting a bit of a hay belly and lacking some energy, but with the addition of some excellent quality baleage, and getting them on grassier (vs. more legume) pasture, they're doing better.
Milk volume? Unimpressive; average in around 20lbs/each/day. I would say our biggest struggle is to keep the cows fed as well as they should be. We still have much to learn. We are using our milk data, DHI data, feed tests and advice from those who've done it to get a handle on feeding them correctly. 80% pasture, 20% dry hay. All are in very good health; perhaps a little less condition than I'd like, but not worrisome. We sure wish this beautiful fall weather was growing more grass, and that the pastures we had to feed were higher in grass than in legumes. Too much protein, not enough energy, which will surely be an ongoing struggle with our 100% grass herd.
We have decided to continue with our late summer freshening; there are some advantages to us with our workload and grass availability, tied in with our need to also finish grassfed beef.
At this time it makes no sense for us to go on the Organic Valley truck. We are shipping conventionally via NFO to Foremost Farms. We are halfway between two OV routes, and 40 miles out of their way. The trucking costs bring us back conventional or less price. We are not about to go out and buy cows just to have more milk, if the right gals are there we will consider it, but we are being cautious and conservative in our expansion, given our lack of experience and wintering facilities. Especially with this economy, we simply cannot lay out a bunch more money at this time. So here we are; less than ideal but still alright.
August 2008: 14 of 17 of the heifers have freshened; 12 BULLS, only two heifer calves! All are doing very well indeed. Our milkhouse and parlor are still not done -- but the end is in sight. We have been milking, using our buckets still, in the new parlor, and we like the parlor very much.
Our fear -- as new dairymen -- was that these heifers would be wild, and the potential for calving problems, and maybe they didn't get bred in a timely fashion were all just that, fears. They're all wonderfully gentle and with our patience (developed!), no "kickers". No calving problems; they all calved in the pasture without assistance, and 82% - 14 of the 17 - calved in 20 days, which would be their first heat with the bull. Shim the bull did a great job!
We are looking forward to completing our milking facilities & getting on the Organic Valley truck. This sure has been a long time in coming; we are sure to enjoy it all the more for the anticipation.
It is so very busy out here at this time, but we will upload pictures as we can. Please consider coming out to see. We milk at 9am, and by 11am the cows and their calves are out in the pasture. It is a wonderful sight to see all those beautiful cows and their calves together. Towards dusk (especially; exuberance can strike at any moment however) the calves get to being playful and start to horsing around, tearing around. It is the single most satisfying time on the farm for us.
GJ
- 8yr old Jersey/Holstein
Rhoda - 13yr old Jersey/Holstein (certified organic)
Karen Marie (born Sept 8 2007)
Little Richard (born Aug 11 2007)
Since
Sept 2007, we are milking 4 in our temporary flat parlor, located in a pole
shed. Baby GJ (GJ's daughter-looking at the camera) and Maidengirl (eating) are
first calf cows.
This
is Richard, the source for GJ, Baby GJ, Maidengirl and 3 heifers. We wish we
could have bought his whole herd, they are so wonderful, but it wasn't to be.
Richard is the last of the great small dairymen. He loves his cows, and we are
fortunate to continue to see him regularly and consider him a friend.
Our
temporary milking place is what's called a "flat parlor", which my friend Marty
built in a half day earlier this year. Prior to this, I milked Rhoda "in the
field", and when GJ freshened, we milked for a bit in a pasture tiestall type of
setup. We currently use bucket milkers and do not yet have a milkroom/bulk tank
setup.
Infinite
innovation! Who needs a gutter, anyway! With a tail lift, one of our three
children or either Julie or I are "at the ready" to bucket that waste. Works
pretty darn good if I do say so myself. We've liked to do things small, see what
we like and don't like, before we spend the big bucks on a "real" facility. We
like being around the cows, vs. only seeing feet and udders. A flat parlor is
not too bad, and economically I think it will make sense as well.
Yep,
that's right, we leave the calves to suckle the cows, and they did communal
feed. Milk letdown was somewhat of a problem, but the calves had zero problems,
have grown very nicely indeed, gotten ZERO GRAIN, and weaning at 2 1/2 months
was no problem. In fact, they made a racket for only 3 days, and it was right at
the bad winter weather change (less than ideal of course).
The
parlor "in action". We have fed about 1lb or so of grain along with some
probiotic & mineral, but as of now, no grain, and no plans to start again, they
get some really nice 4th crop "special" hay. That's what Richard calls it. We
milk once a day (OAD milking). Our milk is very rich, as you might expect. Very
nice body condition and excellent health. I would say we've been real lucky too
with no calving problems and just the least bit of mastitis.
All
three calves some two weeks after weaning. Big calves! Yes, the little fatties
did consume a lot of milk. The payback will be down the road. I believe we will
get excellent benefit from their natural development, exercise, social
interaction & learning and excellent rumen development. We shall see!
In
addition to our four cows, we have 17 2year old heifers, now bred, due July
2008. Nope, July wasn't the plan, but that's how it worked out (would have
liked to freshen in May). Beauties, all Jersey crosses, some Holstein, Ayrshire,
Brown Swiss. Thanks to our Amish friends the Swarey's near Dorchester, who do
such a great job.
Good news today! We have been able to get our milk tested, and our SCC -- Somatic Cell Count -- is EXCELLENT. GJ -- 39,000, Baby GJ and Rhoda at 81,000, and Maidengirl (our "problem" cow), on her 3 good teats, 150,000. GJ -- wow that is really great, under 100,000 is "udderly" fantastic, and even 150,000 is very good. Our goal is to average at or under 50k. Richard was able to maintain 65k for 3 years, for a platinum award from Grande cheese. Low SCC = excellent udder health, and contrary to what some think about milking once a day, that it is bad for udder health. Not that we've seen all possible circumstances yet either. We continue to learn!