Clothing Optional: And Other Advantages of Farming Joe Tomandl III and his wife, Christy, seem too young to call themselves second career farmers, but they are both former teachers, having taught agricultural classes for grade school and high school after graduating from college. However, they were also both raised on dairy farms in Wisconsin and always thought that they might one day farm themselves, if the right opportunity arose.

Managed grazing creates the opportunity to farm
The opportunity to farm came in large part, as a realization that farming could provide a good living, and thus a good lifestyle, if it were set up right. What created this realization was watching his parent’s farm, near Medford, WI after they transitioned their confinement farm to managed grazing. His father, Joe II, started managed grazing in the early nineties, because, as he says, “The University of Wisconsin forced me to graze when they took all my sons away for college.” The managed grazing system reduced his father’s workload allowing him to continue farming. It also increased profitability substantially. While Joe and Christy were teaching, they took notice of this and when a farm close by his parent’s farm came up for sale in 1998 they purchased it and started milking cows soon after that.
The farm required lots of work, since it had not been used for milking in many years. Fences, lanes, fertility, pipe lines, water lines and other things had to be addressed immediately. They were soon milking 35 cows on the farm. Yet, while Joe’s dad had made a good living milking 45 cows, Joe realized that, today, for a family to do as well, they would need to expand beyond that number of cows. He and Christy have since expanded their herd a couple of times now, going from 40 to 80 and then to 135.
Running a grazing dairy on heavy soils requires well-developed lanes that will stand up to daily year-round use. The Tomandls have also found it worthwhile to install a concrete feed pad with headlocks to use for winter feeding or during heavy rains. It doubles for use for breeding or pregnancy checking cattle.

Overcoming difficulties
When the Tomandls expanded from 40 to 80 head in 2000 they didn’t quite realize the impact the animals would have on pasture, especially during the wet fall of that year. During the heavy fall rains on their clay soil, they watched the impact from the cows in the pasture as the cows damaged the old sods enough to encourage them to install the feed pad. It also forced them to work up the damaged pastures and seed them with new varieties of grasses and legumes. The new seeding looked exceptionally good, but then came the almost snowless winter of 2002, with extremely cold temperatures, that killed most of their new seeding. If that wasn’t enough, the next summer brought the worst drought in 27 years to Wisconsin, and record low milk prices. When asked how he would get through it his reply was typical of his positive attitude, “I don’t know yet, but we are going to find a way.”
Faced with many acres of winterkilled pastures and drought stunted pastures, Joe & Christy had to scramble to keep grass ahead of the cows. They rented neighboring land and built a lot more fence. Their hard work and persistence paid off. The year after the drought, the rains returned, as did their pastures. Now with extra land in pasture, they were able to expand the herd again, which proved to be a wise decision, because that same year prices hit record highs. And even though the rains were heavy and prevented field work, the good lanes allowed them to keep cows grazing.
When asked about dealing with difficult times in farming, Joe replied, “Welcome to life.” In other words you will find difficult times in any occupation, even with the best planning. It’s important to not to panic during difficult times or be paralyzed by worry. Instead, it’s important to work through the situation. Remember that success doesn’t come from avoiding difficulty, but rather from overcoming it.

Farming is a good career choice
Popular opinion has it that farming is much harder than other vocations. However, contrary to this opinion, both Joe and Christy point out that they worked every bit as hard when they were teaching as they do now on the farm. Says Joe, “if you want to do well in any job, you have to put in the extra hours.” With teaching that meant grading papers, leading extracurricular activities, and educating themselves to stay current. At least on the farm they can be their own boss; they have time with their children during the day; they don’t have to drive to work through heavy traffic; and the cows don’t care what they wear, or if they wear anything at all, to work. Financially, Joe says that the combination of low prices, drought and winter killed pastures really cut into their profitability when compared to projections. However, now, with better prices and normal rainfall, they are making more money from dairy farming than both of their former teaching salaries combined.

Farming, like any business takes hard work.
Many farmers opt to transition to grazing to reduce labor and to improve lifestyle. While that is true, it still takes hard work when starting up a new dairy farm. Like any business, the first five to seven years will be busy until the infrastructure is built and the management skills are honed for the job. The 16 stall swing parlor that the Tomandls installed, after several years of milking in stanchions, saved so much labor, that Joe wishes he would have been able to put it in before they started milking any cattle. In addition to the parlor; lanes, fence, and feed pads all took a large amount of time to build. Joe believes that new farmers might be better off setting up some of the infrastructure before milking cows, though it is sometimes a challenge to find financing without income from milking cows. Joe said that trying to set up the infrastructure while milking your herd and doing all the other jobs that come with dairying, makes it more difficult to concentrate on managing pasture.

Pasture management is important to profitability Being able to manage pasture well, to maintain a high level of pasture utilization is an important factor in profitability. There is no better or lower cost feed than well managed pasture. Good pasture management requires planning, observation, and re-planning when factors change. While the cattle can do the majority of the physical work of harvest during the grazing season, it is up to the farmer to do the mental work, make decisions and implement them, and then monitor those decisions. Managing pasture well takes effort, but pays off in more production per acre, higher quality forages, and a longer grazing season. Since feed costs are largest cost of milk production, lowering feed costs can dramatically increase profitability.

Access to information is invaluable
The Tomandl’s current location does have its advantages. For instance, equipment is shared between his farm and his dad’s farm, which spreads out the cost of ownership and maintenance. Ideas and projects are shared, too. And having his dad’s seasoned advice has helped smooth some the learning curve. Another advantage of their location is that they are in an area with an active grazing specialist and two active grazing networks which hold pasture walks along with other educational events throughout the year to exchange information.

Despite having taught agriculture classes for several years, they found it valuable early on to take farm management classes at the North Central Technical College. The agricultural instructors helped them monitor their finances and evaluate decisions. The Tomandl’s have found that the ability to readily access knowledge and experiences of other farmers and specialists is often just as valuable as having access to financial capital. Now that they are six years into their farm operation most of the infrastructure is built and is working well. Ideally, Joe wants the farm set up to be able to run with just the family, though they do hire part-time help. While they have more work ahead of them to get to that point, they are now finding more time to relax and enjoy living in the great north woods with their family.