BROWN COUNTY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – Taking care of a farm isn’t easy for first-generation farmer, Ashley Claussen.
The job is dependent on Wisconsin’s unpredictable weather.
“We’re definitely just kind of stuck,” she said.
Claussen owns Claussen Dairy Farm in Denmark.
Heavy rain has delayed farmers in our area, whether they are tending to crops or animals.
Claussen tells FOX 11 for her dairy cows, it means a delay in buying food.
“We don’t produce our own crops, we work with a larger farm down the road that we buy all of our feed from.”
The farm she’s talking about is Deer Run Dairy in Kewaunee.
Farmers like Claussen have to wait on feed sellers like Deer Run to harvest their crops.
But too much rain delays the harvest.
“We’re just hoping that we can get the harvest done before we get a frost,” said Deer Run Dairy Farm crop manager, Derek Ducat. “But being that were pushed almost a month back it’s going to be pretty challenging.”
For Claussen, a wet spring has more of an indirect impact on her farm. That’s because she tends to livestock. But for the farmers growing crops, the effects hit closer to home.
“We’ll got all the crops in but a lot of them are going to be a month late and the yield is going to be reduced quite a bit,” said Ducat.
Less yield means less crops to sell and less money to be made.
But because farmers like Claussen still need to feed their animals, Ducat tells FOX 11 the price of the feed goes up to compensate for time lost.
“We can sell a little bit and make a little bit more on it. He needs to make more off of selling feed to farmers to offset his costs later in the year.
But for Claussen that means more money coming out of her budget.
“We’re definitely going to take a big hit on that.”
With hopes of getting back on track, Ducat says he needs the weather to stay warm and dry.
But until then, Claussen says farmers like herself are forced to adapt.
“This is an industry where we are definitely dependent on the weather that God gives us and we just kind of sit back and roll.”
