Wisconsin dairy farm closures hit three-year high

MADISON, Wis. (WMTV) – After proudly owning and working a dairy farm in Sauk County for over 100 years, throughout 5 generations, the Reisinger household bought their cows in 2021.

“It does really feel like one thing was taken from you,” Brian Reisinger stated.

The day the cows departed, Brian Reisinger stated the cows gave extra milk than they ever had earlier than.

“I feel they possibly knew they had been taking place the highway,” Reisinger stated.

Relatively than promoting the entire farm, the Reisinger’s transitioned from milking cows to elevating heifers and planting money crops. This is part of a bigger Dairyland pattern.

“Normally, the farms which were exiting are typically a bit on the smaller facet. The farms which can be rising are typically the farms which can be form of the larger farms,” Chuck Nicholson, an affiliate professor with the Dairy Innovation Hub at UW Madison, stated.

Wisconsin has misplaced practically 10,000 dairy farms over the previous 20 years, in keeping with Nicholson. In information launched final month, the Nationwide Agricultural Statistics Service says greater than 400 dairy farms in Wisconsin shut down final yr. That marks a three-year excessive in dairy farm losses.

“It’s not precisely a small versus massive form of subject,” Nicholson stated. Smaller farms are more and more shifting away from dairy, being absorbed by larger farms or closing all collectively.

In the meantime, bigger farms can unfold their mounted prices, like amenities and gear, over a bigger variety of cows, Nicholson defined. Making their prices decrease and their margins higher.

Past economics, shifting demographics have performed a task in Wisconsin’s altering panorama. The common age for a farmer in Wisconsin is 55, and never each farmers’ kids wish to take over. Having a second technology prepared to hold on the enterprise is one factor Janet Clark says has saved her smaller household farm alive.

“Plenty of the farms don’t have the following technology like my mother and father had the good thing about,” Clark, the second-generation proprietor of Imaginative and prescient Aires Farms in Fond du Lac, stated.

No matter how the state obtained right here, Reisinger stated dropping small farms impacts Wisconsin’s tradition.

“It’s an enormous a part of who we’re as Wisconsinites,” Reisinger stated. “In order you lose that, you do find yourself dropping a bit of your self.”

Nicholson stated theses trade adjustments doubtless received’t influence grocery retailer cabinets. Milk manufacturing has elevated as larger farms increase.

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