Jonathan Gates reports from Howmars Farm in Franklin, Vermont. Howmars is a certified organic dairy farm, one of many Organic Valley/CROPP Cooperative farmer members who supply the milk that goes into making Stonyfield's yogurts and smoothies. The entire family pitches in on this third-generation farm. Jonathan and his father, Howard, converted the farm from conventional dairy farming to organic 9 years ago. Meet Jonathan. He farms with his wife Karen, sons Benjamin, Justin, and Noah, and Jonathan's parents, Howard and Mary.
Farmer Jonathan is taking a break from writing this week. We thought we'd take this time to give you a glimpse into organic farming and why our company thinks it's important to support it:
At last count, there were 5,000 organic farms in the U.S. states. Many small family farmers have converted to organic as a more economically viable and ecologically sound method of farming. One key to growing crops organically is to do so without the use of toxic and persistent pesticides. (Read more in "What Is Organic".)
Artificial Insemination is the norm for heifers at Howmars Farm
Farmer Jonathan is taking a break from writing this week. Back in March, he wrote us this review about farm visits from his artificial insemination technician:
Bob Cole, our AI (artificial insemination) technician, stopped at the farm this morning to service one of our cows. I had noticed Loonette, an 8-year-old cow, in heat last evening and had called in for Bob to stop this morning.
We have all our cows and heifers artificially inseminated. We have never kept a bull on the farm, for several reasons. The two main reasons are safety and genetic gain. Bulls can be very dangerous and every year you hear about someone being attacked by one. By using AI sires, I can choose bulls that are genetically superior and will give me daughters that will have the characteristics I am looking for in my animals.
Bob works for Genex, a partner in CRI, and has been coming to our farm for over 15 years. He does a great job for us, and is an important member of the "team" I rely on to make our farm a success.
The bull semen is stored in a tank filled with liquid nitrogen, and the straws containing the semen are immersed in the -273 F liquid. Bob pulled the straw of the bull I wanted to use on Loonette, did his paperwork, got what he needed out of his equipment box, and we headed out to the freestalls to find the cow that was in heat. After palpating the cow to make sure where to place the semen, Bob inserted the breeding gun and released the semen near the cervix of the cow. Hopefully, in about nine months, Loonette will be giving us a nice heifer calf.
After packing away his gear, Bob does a sanitary boot wash to make sure not to spread anything between any of the various farms he visits. Our dog, Yukon, loves it when Bob visits because he always carries special treats in his truck--treats Yukon gets just before Bob leaves the property!
A Bovine Bugle reader wrote to ask Jonathan what a pole barn was, something he mentioned in an early entry. Jonathan writes:
One of our faithful Bovine Bugle readers, Helen, had an interesting mental picture of what a pole barn looks like (a giant teepee, she thought), so I've posted a picture of what it actually looks like.
Instead of a building built on a concrete foundation or concrete blocks, we set used utility poles in the ground, ran braced-up connector beams between the poles, and ran roof rafters from the beams to the ridge pole. It makes an inexpensive building, makes good use of uses utility poles, and provides all the shelter our animals need during the winter season.
--Jonathan (left), Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont
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Write to:blogger@stonyfield.com Suzanne comments: Very cler re-use for these poles. I am in awe of you hard-working dairy farmers. Keep on keepin' on! (As they used to say).
Farmer Jonathan explains how he uses wood from his land
A reader wrote in to ask if we use the hardwood harvested from our farm for furniture or flooring (see April 5 entry below).
While I don't use any of my trees for furniture, yet, the oak floor in my house was milled from red oak I cut in our woodlot. I have over a thousand feet of various harwoods waiting in stacked piles for some future use. Also, the new section of my house, the Horsebarn, the sugarhouse, and the heifer pole barn are all built with white pine, hemlock, and eastern larch (tamarack) cut and sawn here on the farm.
I sold the load of hardwood logs mentioned earlier to help finance the purchase of some haying equipment for use this summer.
I want to answer a few questions we have gotten in regards to some of the entries we have done lately here in the Bovine Bugle. We always appreciate it when our readers send it questions.
Karen wanted to know what ketosis is and what is a "drench" (see the Bovine Bugle entry for March 22, 2006). Ketosis is a condition most often seen in bovines at calving time. At calving, often the cow simply eats less. This happens at a time when the energy demand on her body is at its highest. If her intake of feed is not meeting the energy demands, she will then start burning stored body fat. This body fat is sent to the liver and is converted into a temporary energy supply called ketones. If the level of ketones becomes too high, the cow will lose her appetite, thus compounding the problem further and possibly leading to a host of other problems.
We treat cows with ketosis by giving them dextrose intravenously, and by drenching with a product called Keto-aid, which contains propylene glycol and niacin. In drenching, we simply put about 300ml (10 ozs) in a drench bottle and pour it down the cow's throat. Sometimes a cow doesn't appreciate this, and I end up getting drenched. Anyone familiar with the Atkins diet might recognize the terminology in regards to burning fat and producing ketones. When I heard this, I thought, "Wow, when this is happening to my cows it's a bad thing. Can it really be good for people?"
For ten days this was the scene inside the sugarhouse. The evaporator pans sat idle, the storage tank was empty, the canning unit poised to handle the 219 degree syrup as it came off the arch. The only activity was my dad's daily hour-long visit to build a small fire in the arch to thaw out the frozen sap so that it would not freeze so hard that it would damage the soldered seams of the pans.
While we waited patiently for the sap to run, we caught up on things in the barn. Karen and I bedded the freestalls with fresh sawdust, making the girls nice and comfy. There is always at least one cow who will stand in a freshly bedded stall and paw out the sawdust with a front hoof. That drives me nuts, but I guess they just want to play.
Sometimes you'll see one with its face and head covered with sawdust, and you know that cow had just been rubbing its head in the pile of fresh bedding at the front of a stall. The maternity pens needed cleaning after the first round of calves since December. With the help of the boys, and a couple shovels, forks, and wheelbarrows, the pens were cleaned, bedded, and ready for the next expectant mothers in no time.
The forecast for the end of the week sounds promising, and we cling to the weatherperson's every word during the noontime and 6 o'clock telecasts. Little children are hushed, and whatever you are doing is stopped, as the forecast is given for the upcoming days. Will all the hard work done to this point be in vain, or will Mother Nature cooperate and give us those warm days and cold nights we need to make the sap flow in the sugar maples? Time will tell.
"Moo-vie" News: Tapping the Maple Trees to Gather the Sap
Jonathan and his family began the "sugaring" season in early March with the help of his three sons and his father. He hung buckets on 400 trees back when the weather was unseasonably warm for northern Vermont. Now, however, the nightime temperatures have cooled, so the sap is not yet running! His dad is standing by, ready to operate the boiling machinery in the sugarhouse once the sap is gathered. We'll show you videos of the "boiling off" process--heating the sap to turn it into syrup--just as soon as the weather cooperates.
PRESS ON THE ARROW IN THE MIDDLE OF THE STILL PHOTO TO PLAY THE VIDEO!
Sorta like the Wells Fargo Wagon...supplies come to the farm
Every third Monday you can hear a diesel truck rumbling up Beaver Meadow Road towards the barn, and then it slows to a stop in front of the milkhouse. The white truck with the red and white shield on its side belongs to Dan Larivee, the IBA dealer who covers this area of our county. IBA stands for Independent Buyers Association, and Dan's truck is a farm supply store on wheels. If a farmer needs it, Dan has it. His wares including anything from detergents to clean your milking equipment; medicines and herd health management products to keep your animals in top form; boots to keep your feet warm and dry; to a new hose handle to replace the one the cow just stepped on and broke.
Dan--who lives here in Franklin and who I have known since from when I can remember--has been coming to the farm for more than a decade. He's another member of the "team" that keeps our farm going. He always has a pleasant word to say, often knows what we need before we tell him, and is always ready for a wrestling match with one of the boys if they happen to be around. With the cost of fuel today, it saves us some money not having to drive into St. Albans, 15 miles away, to pick up items Dan delivers right at our barn doorstep.
Today we needed another jug of powdered teat dip, a gallon of keto-aid drench, and a gallon of acid detergent for the milking system. Dan printed up our bill on his computer in the back of the truck, brought our purchased items into the milkhouse, gave the boys another quick tussel, and was on his way to the next farm. Like the tin peddelers and cobblers that went from farm to farm over a hundred years ago, Dan traverses the countryside selling his wares to farmers on his way.
While waiting for the sap to start running again, I finished cutting some more hardwood logs to fill out the load I had started almost two months ago. The ground had frozen up just enough so I wasn't skidding the logs through the mud or rutting up the road through the woods. My neighbor, Art Davis, had offered to truck the logs to a mill in St.Albans once I had the load ready.
Art came this afternoon to load up the truck. He supervised, while his son-in-law skillfully operated the knuckleboom loader and placed the logs on the back of the log truck. I had logs located in three different spots off our road, but it didn't take him anytime to have them loaded. Art actually had to go back to his place and get another truck to be loaded with some of the logs. I guess I had more cut than I thought. With the logs all loaded, they headed to Hudak's Mill to sell the black cherry, red oak, and white ash that the boys and I had worked to cut and skid over the last few weeks.
Just before leaving, Art said he had checked some of our sap buckets and a few of them were almost full. It looked like tomorrow would be a busy day gathering sap. That was something we had been looking forward too for the last two weeks!
Look for a "Moo-vie News" video of our team tapping the maple trees to gather the sap, here in The Bovine Bugle on Monday!
Jonathan Gates reports from Howmars Farm in Franklin, Vermont.
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Bob Cole, our AI (artificial insemination) technician, stopped at the farm this morning to service one of our cows. I had noticed Loonette, an 8-year-old cow, in heat last evening and had called in for Bob to stop this morning. 
