Barn full of memories: John Born

What year did you start farming, and what year did you retire? My wife, Sue, and I purchased our farm, Badgerland Dairy Farm, in 1996 from my parents, Wallace and Margaret Born. I worked here all my life up until that point. We sold the cows in 2022. My dad is 95 years old and still comes out to help on the farm every day.

Tell us about your farm when you started, and describe what it looked like when you retired, including how many cows you milked when you retired. When we took over in 1996, we milked about 50 cows in a very nice tiestall barn that was built in 1967. When we retired from milking, we were still in the same barn and still at 50 cows. We owned 130 acres and added more in 2007 when we bought 18 acres across the road.

What were some of the big advancements you made during your career? We never expanded our herd or built any new buildings. Our advancements were seen more through the genetic side. We switched A.I. companies and started buying semen through David Rose of Garden of Eden Genetics. Those genetics made us competitive in the show ring; otherwise, we would never have had the success we did showing. Our kids were in 4-H and showed at the county fair and state fair. Through better genetics, we also increased milk production.

What did you love about milking cows? We had a registered Holstein herd. Many of our cows were trained to lead as calves and experienced the show ring, so they were mostly tame. That made working with them and milking them in a nice stall barn very enjoyable. I was attached to them. We had cows that won supreme champion and grand champion in the junior show at the county fair, and milking those cows was fun. It made you feel good and gave you energy. Our cows were typey, and it was fun to play with the genetics. I was excited to see what we would get out of it.

What was the highlight of your dairy career? One highlight of our dairy career was winning the Holstein futurity show at the Sheboygan County Fair in 2006. Also, nine years ago this summer, our family received the sesquicentennial farm award. As of 2026, the farm has been in our family for 159 years. I am the fifth generation on the farm.

If there is one thing you wish you could have done differently during your farming career, what would it be? My dream was to build a new calf barn, but we never did. We raised calves in a little barn with individual pens. It was a pig barn when I was growing up, and before that, it was a chicken barn. We changed it from pig pens to calf pens, and it worked for us. We made do with what we had, but I would have liked to build a better calf barn. I probably would have designed a progression-type facility where we could advance the calves by age down to the next pen, all the way to breeding age.

What do you miss most about dairy farming? I miss the everyday contact with the cows and working with family to make a small dairy farm function. We have two kids, Bradley and Melissa, and my brothers helped too.

What advice would you give to a young farmer today? If agriculture is what you like, there are plenty of jobs available in the industry. Farming is just one of those jobs. Follow your dream but keep your options open. Even if you don’t own a farm, you can still be in the agriculture business because there are many opportunities out there.

What is your tie to the dairy industry today? After the milking barn stood empty for four years, our friends from Kress-Hill Dairy sold their commercial herd and moved about 25 registered Red & White Holsteins from their show herd into our barn Dec. 31, 2024. It’s great having cows in our barn again. I’m out there every day because I have a couple of beef calves in the pens as well. I regularly go out and check things over in the barn and do a little maintenance if necessary.

Was retiring an easy or hard decision/transition? Selling the cows was a really tough decision, but I couldn’t have hung on much longer. The timing was right. The Gries family at Libertyland Farms near Valders had just built a new robotic milking facility and were looking to add cows to fill it. They were impressed with our registered Holstein herd, and all the cows were sold to them. I hated the thought of a sale and was very happy we found a good home for our cows. I am welcome to stop in there any time to see the cows and their offspring.

What have you been doing since you retired? Since retiring from milking, we have some beef cattle to take care of, and we raise a few Holstein calves for our three grandchildren to show at the county fair. We also do some cash cropping, and I work at Reisterer & Schnell two days a week as a pickup and delivery driver for lawn and garden equipment and some small equipment.