A32-Lancaster Farming, Saturday, December 12, 1992
The Frank Miller family dairy farm is the home of the highest average pro
tein production in the state and also has been awarded the top 1992 Pen-
DHIA
(Continued from Page Al)
(not through DHIA) have been
averaging around 130,000 or less,
according to the dairy to which
they sell milk.
And while the recognition is
reason for smiles, Frank said it is
more important to him that the
Millers stay a family and that they
keep the land in farming.
The herd management award
program acknowledges those
whose management skills have
resulted in good and consistent
increases in production and envi
able records for reproductive man
agement and somatic cell control.
The purpose of the award is to
reward those dairyman who con
sistently practice overall good
management, not necessarily those
who shine with just rolling herd
average.
Through a point-system
formula which does weigh
heavily the past year’s milk and
milk component production, and
also includes management
aspects operators with herds on
test with Pa.DHIA are judged for
management improvements.
This is the second year for the
herd management awards prog
ram, the brainchild of Pa.DHIA
management.
Last year, Susquehanna County
dairyman D. Byron Hunsinger and,
family were recognized for having
the most improved Holstein herd.
But while Hunsinger acknow
ledged changing a lot of small
things around the farm which was
relfected in a large increase in pro
duction, the Miller family (Frank
especially) maintains that they
really didn’t expect the recognition
because they had been continuing
to farm as they had been with
constant care and attention to
details, diligent work, use of a
nutritionist, insistance on cow
comfort and care, and family
cooperation.
The only real changes were in
feed quality last year produced
some high quality alfalfa hay for
their herd and the sense that the
herd is maturing genetically.
“We don’t really pay attention
to the herd averages,” Frank said.
“But you shouldn’t write this about
me. If it weren’t for Brian and
(Brian’s wife) Bonnie, I probably
wouldn’t be doing this (milking
cows).”
After high school, Brian, 33,
had left the farm for 2'A years to
work heavy construction, only to
return home where he could work
hard for results, not just put in
hours for pay, he said.
Frank explained that he was
considering selling the lows, but
changed his mind when Brian
expressed interest in dairying. “I
Names Miller Farm
told him his home is always here,”
Frank said.
Surrounded by large tracts of
“investor-owned” farms which
in reality are residential develop
ments wailing to happen the
Miller farm sits on the edge of a
plaluea which quickly drops to the
impressive lower Delaware River.
From the farm, the area still
retains its rural apperance. The
community economy in nearby
Martin’s Creek is a strange mix of
tourism business and bedroom
residents.
The tourism businesses cater to
the fisherman who swell the banks
and whose boats cruise the river
from late spring to early summer in
pursuit of the anadromous shad on
its spawning run.
The bedroom community is
largely peopled by urban sprawl
spilled over from New Jersey.
Much of the open farm land is
owned by well-to-do New Jersey
and Pennsylvania real estate inves
tors who either rent the land or
allow farmers to work it for next to
nothing in order to keep down tax
es on their investment (agriculture
status gives it a tax break).
However, Brian said they are
really “house farms” waiting for
the economic weather to improve
before a new crop is planted.
It is significant that most of the
building lots on the other previous
or retiring farmland fetch prices of
$40,000 to $50,000 or more
without improvements.
It is significant because transfer
ring a farm from one generation to
the next is almost impossible with
the state’s built-in incentives to
dispurse the wealth of an individu
al, rather than allow heirs to have
easier footing because of the dedi
cation and hard work of their pre
vious generations.
Frank Miller isn’t about to let
that happen, he said sternly. His
intention is to give the farm
bam, cattle and field to Brian
and Bonnie so they can continue to
keep the farm as a farm and in the
family and not end up as an invest
ment by someone with a lucrative
city business ahd no good place to
put extra money.
It’s easy to see Frank and wife
Arlene are proud of their family
and sons and daughters. All of
them. It’s also easy to see how
good they feel with the working
relationship that has occured.
For many farm families, appa
rent strong wills and lack of com
munications undermine what
otherwise seems*should be a strong
cooperative effort.
lliat’s not true with the Frank
Miller Jr. family operation. Every
body has their jobs. No one, Frank
said, tells anybody else how to do
their job.
But then, he said he doesn’t see
the need for that kind of
bickering everyone is in it
together.
Brian takes care of feeding and
reproduction. Frank takes care of
crops. Arlene takes care of the
books. Bonnie takes care of the
calves. Brian and Frank do the
milking. No outside help milks.
Of course there is temporary
crossover of duties when hay
needs to be made, com picked, etc.
But that isn’t often.
Frank Sr. bought the 160-acre
farm in 1928 among other farms
owned by kin. They live on Miller
Road. He had a variety farm.
Giving most of the credit of his
love of cows to his FFA experience
(he was state vice president in
1954), Frank Jr. said. “I liked cows
and we had calves I showed in
FFA.”
After graduating high school (in
1954), Frank Jr. built an extension
on the barn taking it to 51 comfort
stalls. The herd increased from 18
animals eventually to the current
number.
The only major change was to
add a vacuum pipeline after Brian
graduated high school in 1975.
They’ve been on test for 10
years to help with some manage-
Mase Leads
VERNON ACHENBACH JR.
Lancaster Farming Staff
LEBANON (Lebanon
Co.) Gary Mase, of Lebanon,
didn’t pick up his Pa.DHIA herd
management award as of last
week he wasn’t able to attend
the county annual banquet and his
tester, who has the awards, just
delivered a baby and won’t be back
on the job for a couple weeks.
He said, no matter, it was pleas
ant news to find out from friends
who were able to attend the
banquet.
The recognition is strange, he
said, because it really reflects a tur
naround from a big drop in produc
tion last year.
Hurt by bad weather and an eco
nomy less receptive to his market
ing of Brown Swiss genetics, he
didn’t use his mixed breed herd>for
embryo transfer donors. There was
a period when they-stood dry
that is his mixed breed’s main
function, he said, carrying Brown
Swiss embryos and making milk.
Mase, profiled in Lancaster
Farming’s May 12, 1990 issue,
realizes the backbone of his pro
duction is the same for any dairy
farmer making milk.
Mase is a contract-producer for
Wenger’s Dairy in Lebanon. At the
time of the article, he had 35
nsylvania DHIA management award for the Holstein breed.
Brian Miller drives a tractor, pulling a load of ear com.
ment decisions. However, Frank
said he is not as production
oriented in his culling decisions as
some people might be.
When he bought the majority of
his original cows, the owner told
him that if he wants to build a good
herd, you have to do with good ani
mals. They haven’t culled for milk
production or reproduction rea
sons if they have a “good” cow. A
good cow to them has produced a
Mixed Breed
Gary Mase received the top management award from
- Pennsylvania DHIA in the mixed breed category.
Brown Swiss ipilking cows and
another smaller herd of mixed
breed, including sdhne Holstein
cows. He said he averaged about
70 pounds of milk a day, per cow,
in the tank.
The mixed herd included 15
Holsteins and about six
crossbreeds.
He currently has 10 Excellent
cows in the Brown Swiss herd. But
he doesn’t cull the same way others
might in a strict milk production
operation.
His marketing strategy includes
selling stock in a breed for which
lot of milk, has strong type and
structure, but may be lacking
something else which can be
changed through breeding.
So they have been keeping what
others may have sent to market and
breeding for offspring which fulfill
the potential locked inside the old
er cows.
That is the secret Frank said he
was told in order to build a strong
herd.
Category
he has much admiration. He said
that, while a Brown Swiss may not
perform head-to-head with other 2-
and 3-year-old Holsteins right
now, they will produce compari
tively as 4-year-olds and through
the Later lactations. Furthermore,
their milk component perctentage
is almost a point above Holsteins
on average.
He also said that, because of the
breeds’ sturdy, large frame and
much recognized strength in feet
and legs, they live longer and can
last through more lactations.
(Turn to Pago A 33)