Visitors watch a Rosendale Dairy employee start the milking process on one of two 80-cow carousels in the milking parlor. Employees milk cows for 22 hours of every day.
The numbers are staggering. Starting with the end result, 15 tanker loads of milk leave Rosendale Dairy every day.
That’s 81,000 gallons daily, or nearly 30 million gallons annually, produced by about 7,800 cows. Milking occurs for 22 hours each day, with one hour in the morning and one hour in the afternoon for cleaning.
But how do employees of the massive operation respond to people who say it’s nothing more than a factory and the cows are mistreated?
“I challenge anyone to visit the farm,” said operations manager Bill Eberle. Looking at his watch, he said, “It’s 12:30 and I haven’t had lunch yet; I’m sitting here in an interview. The cows eat a better diet and are better regimented than we are.”
The girls, as the Holstein milkers are affectionately called, are quiet and content as they go about their daily business. When not being milked on one of two 80-cow carousels, they are free to roam in large areas of the freestall barn, with water and feed always available.
The feed, custom mixed on-site, is removed each day, so it’s always fresh. The barn is kept at a relatively constant 50-degree temperature year-round – ideal for milking cattle.
Conditions certainly seem to agree with the girls. With nearly 5,000 cattle in one barn – there are two barns at Rosendale – there’s very little noise. The cattle are quiet and mill about slowly as they eat, drink and relax between milkings. The employees moving them to the milking parlor whistle or call out on rare occasions just to keep them moving when they stop to stare curiously at visitors in the barn.
Rosendale hosts about 10,000 visitors each year.
“These are contented cows,” said Bill Harke, director of public affairs for Milk Source. “If they aren’t healthy and content, it doesn’t help us at all.”
Part of a larger operation
While Rosendale is one of the largest dairy operations in Wisconsin, it is part of a larger company called Milk Source LLC. Run by three owners and hundreds of employees, Milk Source had its start in 1965 when Ted and Dorothy Vosters established a 30-cow dairy in Kaukauna, Wisconsin. They expanded to 80 cows and hired their first non-family employee in 1976. Tidy View expanded to 140 cows in 1978. In 1994, their son, John, and Jim Ostrom bought into the farm, which had a herd of 180.
Within just three years, the herd was at 900, and Vosters and Ostrom bought the entire herd from Vosters’ parents. In 1999 Todd Willer joined the partnership, and Milk Source was formed.
Since then, the operation has grown by leaps and bounds. Omro Dairy was purchased in 1999, with 1,200 cows milked there by the end of the year. The herd expanded in 2000 and again in 2003. Tidy View grew to 6,800 cows.
In 2007, Milk Source Genetics, a show-cow farm, opened with 50 cows in Kaukauna. Rosendale Dairy opened the following year.
Phase II at Rosendale was completed in 2010, expanding the herd there to 8,600.
In 2011, phase 1 of New Chester Dairy opened and a permit for phase 2 was approved by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. Calf Source in Greenleaf, Wisconsin, was purchased.
In 2012, New Chester completed phase 2 and expanded to 8,600 cows. Heifer Source was purchased in Liberal, Kansas.
And in 2014, two new dairies opened in Michigan – Hudson in June and Medina in November.
Cows on the move
Harke explained the girls give birth in maternity wards at their respective farms, and within a day or two, the calves are transported to Calf Source, where they are fed and nurtured until they are about 6 months old. A large part of the care involves building up the individual calf’s immune system.
At about 6 months, the calves are moved to Heifer Source in Kansas. The calf and heifer operations are Milk Source holdings as well.
“The dry climate in Kansas is excellent for the young stock,” Eberle said. “That’s their specialization there.”
As the heifers approach 2 years of age, they are bred and shipped back to one of the Wisconsin operations to give birth and be put into the production system.
“And the whole cycle starts again,” Harke said.
Secondary product
While the primary product of any dairy farm is milk, a natural secondary product is natural fertilizer – manure. Rosendale is surrounded by nearly 2,800 acres of farmland, which provides feed for the girls. The manure from the farm provides about 10 percent of the nutrients needed for that farmland.
Harke said 7 miles of underground fertilizer-delivery pipeline removes 30,000 truck rolls annually from local roads. The $8 million on-site nutrient-management and wastewater system reclaims usable materials including sand, liquid and solid nutrients. Further reducing the farm’s carbon footprint is the adjacent biodigester run by the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh Foundation, which uses Rosendale nutrients to create green energy.
A handout of frequently asked questions states: “Protecting the environment is critical to keeping our farmland productive as well as keeping our communities clean for future generations. Milk Source has extensive waste storage technologies and protocols to assure all manure is reused as fertilizer for crops in a responsible manner that does not allow nutrients to run into our waters. The farms all incorporate efficiencies such as energy-saving lights and sand recycling to keep our farms producing quality milk for generations to come.”
Source: Agri-View
