ShareThisLITCHFIELD, Conn. - Farms are being put to bed for the winter, but for some, life remains busy inside their barns. While there has been a dramatic loss of working farms throughout New England, some are creatively reinventing themselves even in a tough economy.
Arethusa Farm in historic Litchfield is an operation that continues to evolve. What began as a moderate-size dairy farm, operated by one family for 100 years, has now become one of the top dairy-breeding and award-winning farms in North America. This is not your grandfather's farm.
The original farm property, close to the center of town, was saved from development in 1999 by longtime neighbors, and now owners, George Malkemus and Tony Yurgaitis. The farm was up for sale, and a golf course or tract houses on the rolling pastures were proposed by developers. The possibilities compelled Malkemus and Yurgaitis to jump in.
As new owners, Malkemus and Yurgaitis were committed to restoring the farm's heritage, saving irreplaceable agricultural land and open space -- and making sure that Connecticut didn't lose yet another farm. Plus they wanted to treat the animals in the best possible way, in state-of-the-art (but traditional-looking) barns offering all-around cow comfort.
Arethusa Farm's owners also happen to be president and vice president of Manolo Blahnik USA, high-end fashion shoes (familiar to anyone who's watched "Sex and the City"). While this seems like an odd juxtaposition -- the glitzy, high-fashion world meets the bucolic setting of, well, "designer" cows -- it's logical. The two businesses have superior quality at their cores.
Sure, ample resources were necessary; not everyone can buy a local farm to save and transform it. These owners did their homework, hiring the best people they could find who knew how to breed premier cows and make the farm grow, especially in reputation, by carving out a precise niche.
Two of Arethusa's star-status cows, Melanie and Veronica, made history by winning the two top awards at the 2004 World Dairy Expo, which no single farm had ever done. Think Secretariat winning the Triple Crown, and you get the idea.
But Arethusa Farm isn't just about an investment, nor is it for cachet. Malkemus says, "What we have tried to do, through the grace of God, is to support the industry and bring it back to Connecticut. Hopefully, we've accomplished something."
The farm has 300 head of cattle --Holsteins and Jerseys. Its revenue streams are embryo sales to U.S. and international farms, sales of cattle offspring, leasing bulls and selling high-quality milk. It hosted a phenomenal international cattle sale in 2008 called Global Glamour, where one of the Holstein consignments fetched $1 million and the 40 animals sold averaged $97,000.
Reinventing itself again in June 2009, Arethusa Farm Dairy was born. Before this, the breeding farm's milk was mostly a by-product sold to Marcus Dairy. The farm decided it was time to process and sell its own premium-quality milk, following a drastic drop in milk prices paid to farmers (a 50-percent drop over a six-month period); in addition, embryo sales had slowed because of the U.S. economy and a weakening euro.
Even before the dairy operation began, Arethusa had been a recipient of a national milk-quality award from Dairy One and was already producing high-quality milk. The farmers felt that they could capitalize on this by meeting the growing demand by educated consumers for local, fresh and natural products. The dairy's truck, which sports a color photo of its prize cows, is painted with the slogan, "Milk like it used to taste."
The farm uses a low-temperature vat-pasteurization method that yields exceptional milk, with a flavor close to melted vanilla ice cream, and which preserves the taste best, unlike the high-temperature process more commonly used. This is artisan milk, bottled at a Bolton, Conn., family-run business, Fish Family Farm.
There are 10 full-time employees, plus two trainees from Japan and one local high-school agriculture student. Most have come from out of state -- Maryland, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Maine -- and ages range from 15 to 70. New England has so little production agriculture left that there aren't many young people interested in working on farms, so Arethusa needs to tap a larger area.
The local communities of Litchfield County appreciate the good will that Arethusa generates. The farm hosts visits for 4-H groups and Future Farmers of America, and supports local high-school farm education.
Arethusa Farm's success is about doing the right thing -- the right staff, the right facilities and the right way to run a farm with superior care for the animals. The ripple effect of sustainable agriculture and supporting the local farming sector are at the core of this farm's principles and a theme that repeats itself as they continue to creatively adapt.
(Linda Hedman Beyus is a Connecticut writer.)
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
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