Modern Farm

Tony Clark is a farmer. He owns a cattle farm where he raises dairy cows. Tony has been in business for forty years and has many satisfied customers. His dairy farm is a family farm and the whole family work there. There are about sixty cows on the farm. Tony manages his herd to get a high quality product for his customers.

The Clarks milk their cows twice a day with the milking machines. The milk never touches the air in the barn. It is drawn through glass pipes into a large refrigerated tank in the milk house. Every other day, a tractor trailer comes to pick up the milk and take it to the processing plant. At the processing plant, the milk is pasteurized, homogenized and packaged, or processed in different dairy products like butter, cheese, cream or yogurt.

Each of Tony’s cows gives about fifty to sixty pounds of milk a day. Tony needs to know when a cow will give birth, because that affects milk production. A cow produces the most milk about four months after giving birth. Then she produces less and less until the milk stops six weeks or so before her next calf is born. A cow can live to be ten years old and may have seven or eight calves in her lifetime.

The family stay busy in many ways. Milking equipment, the barn and the cows must be maintained and kept very clean. Visitors from the health department make visits to the farm to ensure that the farm’s milking system and milk meet the high quality standards.

Tony Clark raises corn, red clover and alfalfa hay for his herd to eat. It helps him save some money. The farmer feeds livestock with grazing and giving them feed. When he feeds his cows, he tries very hard to feed them things that help them grow. He adds vitamins, minerals, and protein so that the animals stay healthy and produce larger amounts of good quality milk.

A cow’s health is watched more closely than the health of most people. The veterinarian visits the farm monthly to check the herd.

As one can see farming is a full-time job. Farmers cannot just leave for a vacation and have someone else take up their responsibilities. Tony says, “I don't think that we've had a good vacation for at least two or three years. We've only had a few days here and there - but just get up and go somewhere different.”