During the week of World Dairy Expo — the first week of October — we tend to have a lot of tour groups come to the farm. Many people are in Wisconsin for World Dairy Expo in Madison, so it is easy for them to make the two-hour drive to our farm.
This year, one of the tours we had was a small group of Dutch, Italian and Danish farmers who came with Lely, the company we purchased our robotic milkers from. These farmers travel a long way, and they come prepared with questions. The Lely group actually wasn’t even in Wisconsin for World Dairy Expo, they just wanted to see robotic milkers. They spent their time touring different farms to see how the robotic milkers worked in different settings and on different farms.
We also had a tour come through with ProCross, the company we do our genetics work with. I’ve become good friends with one of their representatives from France, who brought a group of farmers from Mexico and France. They wanted to see how our cows are milking, what they look like and their overall performance and health.
I enjoy small tour groups because when the groups are really small, we’re able to have more of a conversation. With larger groups, there are usually a lot of questions asked in a short amount of time. I like sharing my knowledge of farming with these large groups, and I always encourage questions, but one of my favorite parts of farm tours is having those small-group conversations where we are able to discuss new and innovating ideas and farming methods.
Our guests from the Netherlands, Denmark and Italy visiting with Lely.