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Jerry Huehl raises about 80 head of dairy cattle along with hundreds of acres of corn, soybeans and alfalfa on the Huehl Acres centennial farm in Freedom Township.
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Farming is hard work, and not everybody is cut out for it.
Not only is the amount of physical labor daunting, farmers are at the mercy of forces far beyond their control, such as weather conditions.
So it is notable when a family farm such as Huehl Acres in Freedom Township beats those odds and survives for five generations.
But if not for the perseverance of its current owners, it almost didn't make it.
Founded in 1839, the centennial farm on Fletcher Road has seen its share of adversity, according to Jerry and Denny Huehl, the two brothers who work the farm as a partnership.
"Our father, Earl, passed away in 1972 when I was in the eighth grade, and mom didn't feel we could handle milking all the cows so she got rid of them," older brother Jerry said.
"With our neighbor, Dennis Englebert, we worked it together over the next four years."
Farm chores often took precedence over activities most teenage boys take for granted.
"I milked cows and went to the prom," Jerry said. "My wife won't let me forget it."
The difficulties passed with the years, and now the Huehls have hundreds of acres under their control.
"We work more than 600 acres of corn and 400 acres of soybeans," Jerry said, as well as some red wheat.
They also raise about 80 head of dairy cattle, along with dozens of acres of alfalfa needed to feed them.
"We own 333 acres," he added. "The original farm was 195 acres and in 1979 we bought the farm north of here from Alfred Kuhl."
They lease additional acreage from area residents, he added.
A family run operation
The brothers try to split up the workload, and each is responsible for different operations.
"Denny is more in charge of the crops; we sell Pioneer seed corn and Denny oversees that," Jerry said.
"I do more with the dairy part of it, and I do the financial bookwork for the farm."
As if that's not enough to do, Jerry is, at least for the moment, president of the Washtenaw County Farm Bureau, as well as holding a seat on the Freedom Township board of review and his church council.
"We're taking on more and more here, so it's time I step out of Farm Bureau," he said.
His wife Susan, a former nurse, works with computers at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital in Ann Arbor.
Their daughter Kate is a registered nurse who is getting married this summer.
Jerry said his son Robert has been working as an engineer with Toyota for two years. He will be moving to San Francisco, but left open the possibility of returning to farm work at some point.
"He has expressed a little interest in coming back to the farm," Jerry said.
Denny and his wife Carol have a daughter, Stephanie, who has a teaching certificate.
Their oldest son, Thomas, attends Eastern Michigan University, and wants to be a pilot.
Younger son Nicholas just graduated from Chelsea High School on June 3, and plans to attend college to study engineering.
"He's put in quite a lot of time after school around here," Jerry said.
Of all the brothers' children, Nicholas has probably done the most farm work, but is still limited by his age.
"It's all right, but it's a lot of work," said Nicholas, 18. "I don't plant corn or drill beans and I don't milk cows by myself," he added.
The Huehls' mother, Mildred Huehl, is retired from the farm and lives in Chelsea now.
The brothers also have help from one hired hand, Nelson Bollinger.
"I do all the morning milking seven days a week, and Nelson milks six nights a week," Jerry Huehl said.
"(Denny) and I trade off doing the chores so we get two days a month off."
Bollinger has spent 14 years with the Huehls, but his experience reaches much further back.
"If you grow up milking cows, there's something inside you that never leaves you," Bollinger said.
Making hay while the sun shines
Although the work of planting crops began in April, late May and early June are still a busy time on the farm.
"The last two weeks have been go-go-go," Jerry said. "We like to start cutting (alfalfa) hay by the end of May."
Because the farm grows almost all the feed necessary for its dairy herd, it's necessary to find a place to store it all.
The mowed alfalfa is piled into three enormous open-air structures lined by concrete on three sides.
When full, the silage can reach more than 30 feet wide and almost as tall.
"We put a plastic tarp on top of the silage pile to keep the rain off, and old tires hold down the plastic," Jerry said.
"The more moisture in the alfalfa, the more spoilage you get, so we save the good silage for the cows and put the spoiled out on the crops; it acts like compost."
The cows don't just graze on any old grass, either. The alfalfa is cultivated and harvested several times during the season.
"For dairy cows you want more alfalfa because it gives them more protein," Jerry said. "The earlier you cut it the better the feed value, and the animal gets more nutrition.
"It all gets balanced; it's very scientific these days."
Cutting the alfalfa, collecting it and storing it takes a team effort.
During the recent first cutting, Jerry worked the mower, Nicholas picked it up and Denny unloaded the 5-ton hay wagon and put it in the silage pile.
"We'll have about 600 tons when we're done (with this cutting), which is about half of what we need for the entire year," Denny said.
"This is the first cut, and hopefully we'll cut three more times this year if we get enough rain."
The weather watchers
There is probably no more important single aspect to farming than rainfall.
A sufficient amount can guarantee a good harvest and a profitable; year for the farmer.
Not enough or too much, and weeks of hard work - or an entire crop - can be lost.
While other farm fields in the area languished under water following a devastating downpour on June 3, Denny said Huehl Acres was lucky.
"We were actually pretty fortunate here; we got about an inch and a quarter, we didn't get the 3 or 4 inches other places got," he said.
"There was a real narrow band where it was the worst. We dodged a bullet."
Once the first cutting of hay is done, the farm can settle into a routine that changes much from month to month, but little from year to year.
Farmers are certainly busy during planting and harvesting, but Jerry Huehl said there is still plenty to do every single day of the year, particularly for a dairy farm:
"Cows have to be milked and cared for every day; the feedlot has to be cleaned and scraped to dispose of the manure at least twice a week; and every two weeks a veterinarian comes to check the animals' health," he said.
BREAKOUT BOX:
A monthly farm calendar
Jerry Huehl, a partner in the Huehl Acres farm with his brother Denny, described a number of things that must be attended to on a monthly basis in order for a farm to be successful.
January: "Hauling grain to the elevator, working on equipment, Denny takes seed orders from other farmers, we meet with the fertilizer supplier over the next couple of months to figure out what we need and lock in a price."
February: "Pretty much the same as January, but in addition we do the first of two yearly hoof-trimmings for the cows; I also meet with the tax person in early February to get the books ready."
March: "Working in the shop, bedding the animals, hauling grain, snow removal, inspect and clear the fields of branches and other debris so we don't get a surprise when we're tilling and damage the equipment."
April: "Finish getting the equipment ready to plant."
May: Planting corn, soybeans, and any new hay seedings; we try to get most everything done by the end of May."
June: "Chopping haylage, making dry hay, which we'll try to do every four weeks through September."
July: "Harvesting red wheat, baling straw, empty the liquid manure lagoons and spread it on the fields."
August: "Making more hay, plant a fall seeding of alfalfa."
September: "Chopping corn for silage in silos."
October: "Harvest soybeans and start putting high-moisture corn in silos to ferment, harvest remaining corn."
November: "Finish up fall tillage work."
December: "We're usually still doing some corn."
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