Erickson Dairy Farm
Farm Story
In 1979, Randy Erickson purchased a dairy farm outside of Clintonville, Wisconsin. He and his wife Carol started with 40 dairy cows and by the time their son Adam joined the farm in 2007, they were milking 350 cows. Today Randy, Carol, Adam and his wife Kristy milk around 450 cows as well as farming 1,050 acres. To provide feed for the herd, Erickson’s grow alfalfa, grass and corn.
Randy and Adam chose to farm because they enjoy everything about it, from crops to cows. Their passion for farming runs deep as they spend most of their day operating the farm.
Steps Towards Conservation and Benefits
Always looking for ways to improve their farm, they chose to be a part of the Upper Fox-Wolf Demonstration Farms.
Adam and Kristy Erickson with their kids on the family farm.
Having tried some different conservation practices, Randy and Adam hope being a part of the demo farms will provide them with guidance for their mission to have a better interaction with the environment. They’ve done some rye cover crops and hope to establish more cover crops. Randy and Adam have done some low disturbance manure application with a toolbar on their tanker, and they look forward to using this more. They’d also like to expand their no-till acres as they learn more about improving the soil. The more they can learn and improve their farm, the greater the chance that future generations will be able to sustain the farm.
While Randy and Adam are still fairly early in the adaptation of most conservation practices, they have already experienced some benefits. Mainly, their workload has been reduced. Additionally, their harvestable buffers have allowed them to manage poor acres with less inputs but still get a crop.
