Up for the Challenge
Mike and Keri Salber, of rural Browerville, have been farming most of their lives. For many years, they were conventional farmers, using herbicides, for instance, to control weeds and antibiotics to treat sick animals.
A number of years ago, the Salbers decided to try a different approach to solving the challenges of farming. Mike said they didn’t like the idea of using so many chemicals and handling dangerous sprays. Mike and Keri were concerned about the health and safety of their six children and the environment. Mike said that even after he would wash the clothes he wore while spraying, he still worried there were residues left that might affect the family.
The Salbers like a challenge, and they started reading books about topics such as why different weeds grow in certain areas. They began to learn about soil compaction, crop rotation, alternative methods of weed management and herbal remedies for mastitis and milk fever. The family is near to completing the transition to organic certification for their land and dairy. This is a four-year program, including three years of using no pesticides, or petroleum-based or sewage sludge-based fertilizers. During this transition, the Salbers have been involved in a program with the Todd Soil and Water Conservation District, called the Environmental Quality Incentive Program (EQUIP).
Mike said the EQUIP program is concerned with soil and water conservation. The program has aided the Salbers with cropland nutrient management and helped them apply the proper amounts of organic fertilizers and manure.
Recognition
The Salbers have been recognized for their farming practices by the Todd Soil and Water Conservation District. They recently received Todd County’s Outstanding Conservationist Award for 2002.
Visitors to the Salber farm don’t need a Ph.D. in agriculture to appreciate the beauty and health of their land and animals. The cows spend almost all their time outdoors on pasture. During the growing season, the dairy herd is moved to fresh pasture three times a day: after morning milking, at noon and then after evening milking. This style of farming is known as “rotational grazing” and it is beneficial for the animals and land alike. In the winter months, they are let outside between milkings. Mike said one winter day when the temperatures dropped below zero and the winds were blowing, he went out at noon to put the cows in the barn. They were willing to get out of the wind, but they didn’t want to go indoors. Mike said, “I stopped feeling sorry for them after that.”
Mike said one of the tricks to successful rotational grazing is keeping the pastures in a “grazing state”. The grass should not head, or go to seed. In the spring, when the grass is growing faster than the cows can keep ahead of, the Salbers cut some of their pastures for hay. In the summer months, the cows can move through the many paddocks often enough to always have fresh grass yet allow the fields to renew before they are grazed again. The cows know just what it means when they see the Salbers come out to their field to move the wire to give them access to a fresh swath of grass. The cows make a beeline for the lush new pasture and soon the air is filled with the sound of tearing grass and munching.
Livestock
This year’s crop of calves on the farm are mixed-breed offspring from the Salber’s predominately Holstein milking herd. Mike and Keri want to encourage the genetics that favor an animal that efficiently consumes forage and turns it into milk. They are not looking for an animal that breaks world records on milk production, but one that has healthy feet and legs, comes into heat regularly and thrives on forage.
The Salbers haven’t used antibiotics to treat a cow for mastitis for the last seven years. Mike said he “sleeps better at night not worrying about accidently putting treated milk in the bulk tank.” Mike and Keri have been working with a Wisconsin company, Crystal Creek, Inc., to get herbal remedies for ailments such as milk fever, ketosis and mastitis. Mike said if they treat a problem right away, the herbal treatments and the cows’ natural immunities usually take care of the situation.
The Salbers have a dozen brood sows and raise about 200 feeder pigs a year. The sows live in a large, airy pen with deep bedding. They can be separated into smaller areas for farrowing, but generally spend their time enjoying each other’s company or going outdoors into a fenced lot. The baby pigs have run of the place and stop by to visit mom when hunger strikes.
The Salbers sell 50 pigs a year through the Whole Farm Co-op in Long Prairie. Mike has been on the board of the co-op, and an active member, for a number of years. Keri raises around 25 turkeys to sell through WFC, as well as raising 400 meat chickens and a flock of 36 laying hens.
The Salbers grow much of their own feed including: 50 acres of alfalfa for hay, 25 acres of a sorghum/sudan/soybean mix which is cut for silage, 25 acres of spelt (a type of wheat used mainly for livestock feed), 10 acres of high-oil sunflowers and 40 acres of corn.
Learning Curve
One of the management techniques Mike learned about when he was investigating alternative methods of weed control is the use of flame weeding – literally using flame to kill weeds. Flame-weeding can set back large weeds, but zapping weeds as tiny seedlings or before they have three or four leaves is best. Using an old rear-mount cultivator which has been converted into a flame-weeder, Mike keeps his cornfields and sunflowers in good shape. The flamer is hooked up to a propane tank and the flame end can be adjusted for height and angle.
Mike said he has learned a lot through trial and error. He has learned that it is best to flame-weed corn when it is just beginning to emerge. The corn may get burnt along with the weeds, but it is rolled up tight enough that it will re-emerge and continue growing unharmed. Mike has even flame-weeded his cornfield when the corn was four inches tall. He said some of the corn will get burnt, but it comes right back.
Sunflowers are more particular and must be flame weeded before the leaves come out. Mike said the plants will still grow if you flame the leaves, but the mature plants will be stunted. By using flame weeding, cultivation, and crop rotation, the Salbers have found a way to do without herbicides.
A Family Affair
Everyone in the Salber family helps out with chores. The four older boys know how to milk and Keri says, “if they squabble about chores, they get to help mom milk.” Keri milks both shifts, with Mike helping in the morning and one of the boys helping in the afternoon. It takes about an hour to milk, except in the spring, when the most cows freshen and are milking heavily. Mike says, “then you need to find a bucket to sit on and talk.”
The Salbers have been involved with the Sustainable Farming Association of Central Minnesota from the chapter’s beginning. Mike was a charter member of the organization and both he and Keri have served on the board of directors. The Salber farm was featured in an article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune representing the family farms of the Whole Farm Co-op.
Mike and Keri are farming because they love the work, being outdoors and being their own bosses. They hope their children will share this love of the land as they get older. Keri says “once they leave the farm and find out how good they had it, they’ll come back.”
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This story was taken from an article in the Long Praire Leader