Cow Milking Service

Cow milking service LIVESTOCK Dairy (17) 17-1-28 The dairy industry probably loses more farmers to the twice-daily, year-round grind of milking their herds than to fluctuating prices. Geraldine Dittus took advantage of that fact in starting a new sideline cow milking service. The Almont, North Dakota farmer simply ran a 3-word ad in the weekly New Salem Journal last year that stated, "Will Do Milking", and received enough business to keep her going for the rest of the year. One of her first customers, Pat Erhardt, who farms near Almont, hired Dittus so he and his wife could get away once in a while on weekends. Her jobs are mostly close to home in Morton County, though one call came in from the Minot area, a 2 112 hr. drive north. "They wanted me to come up and stay a few days," she says. North Dakota has about 1,500 dairy farms left, about 500 fewer than in 1987. Nation-wide, about 13,000 dairy farms have gone out of business since 1987, says economist Jim Miller of the USDA. Changing life-styles are certainly a major factor, he feels. "There certainly used to be a great number of dairy farmers that took an almost per-verse pride in never doing anything very far from the farm. I think that's less common now," says Miller. Dittus, 51, who raises beef cattle, pigs, sheep and grain on the 600-acre family farm, charges 50 cents to hook up each cow to machines for milking. "I make about $200 extra a month," she says, noting that the only equipment you need to start a cow milking service is a car and a pair of overshoes. (Grower's Guide)

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