By Anne Cook, The News-Gazette, Champaign-Urbana, Ill.
Jul. 29–MANSFIELD — George Kasbergen’s dairy has given new life to an Illinois industry that’s been in decline for years.
Kasbergen operated huge dairies in California and Wisconsin before he built Stone Ridge Dairy, 5 miles north of Mansfield, in 2001. Here, he milks 3,100 Holsteins, almost three times as many as the next largest Illinois dairy. All the milk goes to Grande Cheese in Brownsville, Wis., a manufacturer of high-end specialty cheeses.
That’s appropriate, Kasbergen said, because his name loosely translated from Dutch means “mountain of cheese.”
“We’re here in Illinois because there’s an abundance of feed and milk prices are good,” said Kasbergen during a recent tour of his 640-acre farm, 140 acres of which are occupied by the giant sheds that houses the cows, the feed bunkers, the milking parlor and a smaller, self-contained dairy. That dairy houses the animals that his five children, who range in age from 2 to 10, show all over the state and the country.
Times are good in the dairy business. Kasbergen said milk prices are finally catching up to increased feed costs linked to recent high commodity prices.
“There’s typically a 12-month lag between input and milk prices, so prices finally went up 60 days ago,” he said. “The world supply of milk is short, and the powdered milk price is up. Last January, I was getting $12 a hundredweight. Now I’m getting close to $20.”
“It’s a very exciting time to be in dairy,” said Jim Fraley, manager of the Illinois Milk Producers Association. “Milk prices are near all-time highs, and the good thing is it’s not because of a shortage. It’s increased demand, and a lot of it is domestic, increases in milk and cheese consumption. When you sell more of a product because of higher demand, that’s good.”
Kasbergen and his 34 employees milk their cows three times each day, and the 1,600-foot-long sheds that shelter the animals house an additional 400 cows not producing milk.
Floors of the two sheds are slightly canted to the center so that waste and the sand the cows stand on can be washed to the farm’s waste-treatment system, which recycles the washed sand. Each shed is equipped with fans and ceiling soakers to keep cows cool.
In a closed circuit, milk moves straight from the milking parlor through filtering and chilling equipment into tanker trucks that hold 6,000 gallons of milk apiece. Kasbergen ships out five 6,000-gallon tankers a day.
The dairy has been good for the local economy. Kasbergen pays about $250,000 in property taxes, about $150,000 of which goes to Blue Ridge schools, according to the McLean County treasurer’s office.
He buys crops and silage from neighboring farmers to feed the cows, which consume about 16,000 bushels of corn, 4,000 tons of silage and 300 tons of hay a month, plus dry corn gluten from the ADM plant at Decatur, ground flax seed, alfalfa and soybean meal.
Kasbergen said good food, cow comfort and good management pay off in milk yields. His cows’ production average is 28,000 pounds of a milk a year or 85 to 90 pounds a day.
“He’s No. 5 in the state in per-cow productivity,” said University of Illinois Extension dairy specialist Mike Hutjens. “That’s shocking to our producers that he can come in and build a herd that produces so much milk. There are 1,012 herds in the state, and 3.5 percent of all Illinois dairy cows are in Mansfield. That’s exciting to see.”
Kasbergen’s ancestors were dairymen, first in Holland. His father emigrated to the U.S. and made his way to Long Beach, Calif., where he put together funding to buy a dairy.
Kasbergen’s older brother milks 4,000 cows, another brother milks 2,200 cows and his sister and her husband also run a dairy, all in California. With one brother, Kasbergen also owns a dairy at Brodhead, Wis., where employees milk 1,500 cows.
When he first tried to extend the family business to Illinois in 2000, he was interested in Carlinville, where milk-processing giant Prairie Farms is located. But he finally picked the Mansfield site, in part because of its access to water from the Mahomet-Teays Aquifer.
“It’s not a good aquifer at Carlinville,” Kasbergen said. “You need water to milk cows.”
His proposal to site the $12 million dairy there sparked a storm of protest from nearby residents who worried mainly about odor.
Animal activists also got into the fray, claiming big dairies amount to factory farming. Kasbergen still keeps a large envelope full of letters he calls his “hate mail.”
The state approved the project, but officials who talked about building an access road backed away, and Kasbergen had to spend $600,000 building the road, something he still resents.
“I stayed focused, I followed all the rules, and I got my permit Sept. 11, 2001, an unforgettable day,” he said. “I started milking 1,200 cows in October 2002, and it took 13 months to get where we are today.”
Don Bergfield lives 2 miles from the dairy, and he said life hasn’t changed much in his neighborhood since it opened. Bergfield, a Parkland College instructor, raises dairy goats.
“I used to joke that I was the No. 1 dairyman in Bellflower Township until George’s second cow came,” he said.
Bergfield takes his agriculture students to the farm to see processes that aren’t easy to find in central Illinois.
“He’s been happy to give us tours, and I take my crops students out to see the different types of feed,” Bergfield said.
David Adamson of Bellflower, an outspoken opponent of the dairy when Kasbergen was siting it, did not return several messages asking for comments about current conditions.
Hutjens said Kasbergen has a market advantage because he ships milk several times daily and can maintain the high quality and excellent yields necessary to make cheese.
Fraley said Kasbergen is a pioneer in state dairy circles. “We’ve learned a lot through his operation,” he said. “He wants to show what can be done and how it can be done right.”
Fraley believes Kasbergen’s success will attract other dairies to the state.
“We’re seeing interest from grain producers in all parts of Illinois wanting to attract livestock operations,” he said. “We’ve identified 14 or 15 sites that would be tremendous for larger dairy operations with willing partners to supply feed and accept the manure for their fields.”
Kasbergen hires consultants to do environmental assessments to meet rules and reporting requirements.
“There’s more and more paperwork in this industry,” Kasbergen said. “I’m just a dairyman. I like to be out with the cows.”
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