10-Lancaster Farming, Saturday, May 3, 2003
B
Kids * Korner*
Kids Experience Life On The Farm Through Ag In The Classroom
LOU ANN GOOD
Food And Family
Features Editor
REINHOLDS (Lancaster Co.)
Meadowview Farms offered
students from the Ephrata School
District an expansive view of the
latest in dairy farming.
As part of the Ag in the Class
room studies last week, about 300
fourth graders had the opportu
nity to visit the farm and see
firsthand how milk is produced.
The tour included a hay ride
through the barns and around
the grounds and a view of the
whole dairying process from the
observation deck.
Meadowview Farm is owned
by the David and Joyce Zimmer
man family. Zimmerman said the
farm has been in the family since
1912, when his great grandpar
ents purchased it.
The farm operated as a typical
family farm until about a year
and a half ago, when they decid- . Fourth grade students
ed to expand the facilities so that riding on a wagon, which
their adult children could make a
career on the farm.
The Zimmermans went from
milking 80 cows to 650. Replace
ments are born on the farm but
moved at three weeks of age to a
Lebanon County farm until the
heifers freshen
The observation deck is open to visitors every day. The
barns and the milking operation can be clearly viewed.
Details about the process are clearly displayed to enable
visitors to participate in a self-guided tour.
Lancaster County Dairy Princess Kari Martin, left, and
her sister Jenna, who is a dairy ambassador, handed out
ice cream and taught students the importance of includ
ing milk in their diets.
The six-row barn with a slotted
floor makes the work easier.
Son James showed the chil
dren the types of feed used to
keep cows healthy.
James pulled a sliver of glass
from the feed and asked the chil
from Highland Elementary School tour the Zimmerman farm by
took them through the barns and around the property.
dren how that got into the cow’s
feed.
Someone discarded a glass soft
drink bottle in the field. When
the tractor driver was mowing
the fields, the glass was hidden
by the corn and inadvertedly
chopped into the feed.
James explained that a magnet
is inserted into each cow’s stom
ach to keep metal that is acciden
tally swallowed from hurting the
cows. But the magnet does not
attract glass and aluminum cans,
which can kill a cow.
Sue Bollinger, who heads the
Ephrata School District’s Ag in
the Classroom program and who
also lives on a dairy farm, ex
plained about helping a calf grow
up to be healthy and give milk.
Students were told that all
cows grow horns. If the horns are
allowed to grow full-size, the
horns could hurt other cows and
humans. The calves are dehorned
at 15 months of age when the
horns are about thumb-sized and
called a horn bud.
“Does it hurt?” a student
asked.
“A little, but it would hurt
other cows much worse if they
weren’t dehorned,” Sue said.
She showed them how semen
from Wisconsin bulls are stored
in a nitrogen tank at 360 degrees
below zero. She stuck a rubber
band inside to show how the in
stant cold froze the band, which
Students answer ques
tions to reveal how much
they grasped about dairy
farming.
snapped like a sliver of hard plas
tic.
Sue explained how calves are
similar to human babies, who
need to be fed milk replacer simi
lar to baby formula. Cows cannot
give milk unless they give birth to
a calf. Generally a cow is two
Sue Bollinger, who coor
dinates the Ephrata School
District Ag in the Class
room program for 15 years,
explains how calves are
cared for on the farm.
David and Joyce Martin, with the help of their children,
Sharon, James, Dale, and Cathy, operate Meadowview
Farm. The farm, which has been in the Zimmerman family
for about 100 years, was recently expanded to 230 acres.
New barns and a milking parlor with observation deck
were also built. The Martins milk 650 cows three times
daily.
years old when it has its first calf.
The cows gives milk for seven
months, before having a “vaca
tion,” when it is dry two months
before starting the cycle over
again.
An observation deck on the
second floor enabled the students
to see the milking process from
start to finish.
Zimmerman said, “Visitors
can come without an appoint
ment to watch. It’s safe, and it
doesn’t interfere with people who
are milking.”
In addition to family members,
Zimmerman said, “We have an
excellent labor force 12 em
ployees, mostly part-time.”
Lancaster County Dairy Prin
cess Kari Martin and her sister
Dairy Ambassador Jenna Martin
were on hand to hand out ice
cream. They used charts to ex
plain how milk has protein, vita
min A, thiamine, riboflavin, calci
um, and iron.
“Soda has none of those nutri
ents, so milk is a much better
choice,” Kari said.
Students expressed amazement
to hear that to receive the same
amount of calcium that an eight
ounce glass of milk provides, they
would need to eat 304 cups of
popcorn, eight pounds of tuna,
seven cups of broccoli, 7 cups of
red beans, or 10 large fried eggs.
FFA students from Ephrata
High School helped with the tour.
Several “learn stations” were set
up to teach farming basics.
Sixteen-year-old Kathy Zim
merman helps milk the cows on
the family farm and is also an
FFA student. She said of the re
cently expanded operation, “It is
much easier to milk and more
fiin.”
She explained the milking pro
cess to the students and said the
band around each cow’s neck
contains a radio transmitter. It
detects the cow’s motion. An ac
tive cow reveals that a cow might
be in heat. A less active cow than
normal shows she might be sick
or injured.
(Turn to Page B 11)