Dairy farmer Ralph Martin stands near a Holstein heifer, that is being donated to the Mennonite Central Committee relief sale.
Dairy farmer Ralph Martin strolls past the row of calves — including one born that day — in one of his family’s bright, airy barns and points to a heifer standing outside.
Martin and his family, owners of Ontowa Farms near Elmira, are donating the pregnant heifer to the Ontario Mennonite heifer relief sale on Feb. 20.
They’ve done the same thing every year for more than three decades.
“We missed only one year,” Martin says, sitting in the warm kitchen of his farm home on Northfield Drive while his wife, Judy, rocks their young grandson to sleep. “We were short a heifer and bought one instead that year.”
Every year, for 33 years — through good times and hard times — farmers in Waterloo Region and the counties of Wellington, Perth, Huron, Bruce and Grey have quietly donated heifers to a relief sale whose proceeds go directly to the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC). This is the 34th year.
Many of the farmers are Mennonite, some are not; it’s an inter-denominational effort that has raised a total of $4.6 million so far for relief and development work around the world, says Clarence Diefenbacher, a semi-retired farmer who is chair of the sale’s organizing committee.
Last year, about 103 heifers raised more than $175,000. The average price was $1,525 per animal, Diefenbacher says.
Rick Cober Bauman, MCC Ontario executive director, says he knows of no other sale like it in North America. This is a dairy farmer initiative, he says.
“There’s no other community that I know, certainly not in the Mennonite Central Committee community across North America, where … dairy farmers donate the very kind of core of their business which is the cow, the heifer.
“They sell it to other farmers who then pay a premium for these heifers because they know the money is going for relief development with MCC.
“It’s just one of the most wonderful examples of people taking the gifts that they have — that being the gift of being a dairy farmer and knowing how to grow quality cattle — and then saying ‘out of my gift I choose to share.'”
For this year’s sale, farmers have chosen a heifer that they’ll donate. In many cases, their parents did the same when they were children.
“There are second and third generations now in families that have supported the sale,” Diefenbacher says.
A group of retired and semi-retired farmers, including Diefenbacher, provide funding to purchase “headliners,” better-than-average heifers with pedigrees to bolster the sale.
Semen and embryos are also donated for auction.
The giving doesn’t stop with farmers. Truckers donate their trucks and services to pick up the animals at the farms and take them to David Carson Farm & Auction Services in Listowel, which donates the space and staff needed to run the auction.
Donors contribute hay, feed and advertising. Beautiful Holstein cow wood carvings by Harold Erb of Wellesley and crokinole boards made by Willard Martin of Elmira are auctioned off. Another artist, Eli Martin, meticulously crafted a miniature team of horses and wagon that he donated every year until his death at age 107 in 2012.
Then there are the farmers who buy the animals, often at a price above the normal cost because the money goes to Mennonite Central Committee.
Corporate sponsors buy heifers and re-donate them to raise even more money.
Hundreds of people show up on the day of the sale. Some give cash donations.
“It’s just a nice community thing and the place fills up,” Ralph Martin says.
The heifer auction is a big undertaking that city-dwellers might not be aware of, al though they probably know of the annual quilt auction at the New Hamburg Mennonite relief sale, which raised $320,000 last year.
Many years ago, farmers looked at the quilt sale and wondered what they could do to help, Martin says.
“Farmers said ‘we can’t make quilts, but we can raise money with a heifer sale.’ It’s really neat how that fell together.
“I don’t think they ever anticipated at the first sale that it would continue this long,” Martin says. “The dairy industry has really changed.
“When they started this sale, there were probably five times as many dairy producers in the province of Ontario. There’s been a lot of consolidation in the dairy industry.
“There are not so many farmers, but new people stepped up to the plate … It’s an exciting industry and going to that sale, you have a lot of fun.”
The heifer sale is held at a time of year when farmers aren’t busy with harvesting and seeding.
Ralph and Judy Martin and their sons, Phil and Ryan, whose farm operation has about 250 head of cattle, feel strongly about sharing what they have.
Donating a heifer is one of several things that the family and, indeed, many other Ontario farmers do in a year.
Phil Martin helps truck the heifers to the relief sale. Ryan Martin is involved with MCC’s Elmira meat-canning efforts. The family gives to Mennonite Central Committee’s global family program that supports education in communities around the world. They donate 300 litres of milk a year to the food bank.
Dairy farmers donate the milk while truckers haul the milk for free and processors process it for free, says Martin, who is also on the board of the charitable foundation for the Gay Lea dairy co-operative.
“If you are privileged, I think you carry a responsibility to help others,” Martin says. “I think there is nothing more rewarding than to see somebody else succeed because you helped them.
“We live in a privileged country and we have the means.”
In the early 1970s, when Martin was a young man, he worked in MCC’s voluntary service in Brazil for two years. He was single, newly graduated from University of Guelph, and worked on water purification and other projects.
It was his dream to work with MCC in other countries before returning home to farm, he says.
He met his future wife in Brazil, where she was helping her sister and brother-in-law who were also volunteering there. Later, Judy worked with MCC volunteer services in Akron, Ohio.
Diefenbacher sold his dairy herd in 2006, but every year before that, he and his family would donate a heifer. His wife, Marilyn, helps with paperwork.
Diefenbacher’s father, Allen Diefenbacher, was on the sale committee before he was.
“I went canvassing with Dad and observed the excitement he saw and the willingness to share and help people,” says Diefenbacher, who is past president of Holstein Canada and a member of the Waterloo Region Hall of Fame.
All money raised at the sale goes to MCC which decides where it’s needed most, he says.
“With what’s going on in the world right now, there are so many places.”
Every year, he says, he can count on a nucleus of farmers to give, and “every year we get 10 to 15 new people.”
It’s about helping, and it’s about gratitude for help received, Diefenbacher says.
“I think one of the things is, that with our family trees as Mennonites, most of us go back to people who have emigrated from Europe. What I remember from growing up is my parents helping some of these people after they immigrated to Canada. Some stayed in our home until they had a place to stay.
“It is in thankfulness for help our forefathers received that keeps this going on.”
Source: Guelph Mercury
