Des Moines Register
04-30-06
Dairy farm freshens up
Long-awaited ISU research site at Ames promises state-of-the-art operation
ANNE FITZGERALD
REGISTER AGRIBUSINESS WRITER
Ames, Ia. — After decades of discussion and more than two years of planning,
Iowa State University's new dairy research farm is getting off the ground.
"They're moving dirt," Leo Timms, dairy specialist with Iowa State Extension
in Ames, said last week.
In 2002, lawmakers authorized selling ISU's research farm in Ankeny, stipulating
that the university use proceeds to build a new dairy.
Environmental concerns delayed the sale of the Ankeny property. In 2003, Iowa
State announced it planned to close its historic teaching dairy farm on the south
side of Ames. ISU alumni, students, faculty and industry supporters feared that
the dairy science program, created in 1896, also was destined to die.
Timms was among those who thought otherwise. "We knew this project was
going to happen," he said.
A week ago, ground was broken for the Dairy/Animal Science Education and
Discovery Facility. It will be built on 27 acres of an 887-acre tract south of Ames,
located at the south end of Iowa State's animal science corridor. It will include a
state-of-the-art milking parlor, a visitors' center with a view of the parlor,
laboratories, meeting rooms, a veterinary medicine teaching area, and stalls for
450 milking cows, replete with rubber mattresses, rather than sand or sawdust.
The cost: $15 million for the first phase, which is to be completed next year. A
second phase costing up to $10 million more will include a pavilion for classes,
educational programs, and student and public events.
Iowa State's Ankeny farm, a 1,031-acre property northwest of Des Moines Area
Community College, was sold last year to the city of Ankeny for development.
The sale will help pay for the new farm near Ames. The transaction was delayed
by testing the property for possible harmful environmental residue from the Des
Moines Ordnance Plant, which made munitions there during World War II.
Ankeny agreed to pay $23.6 million for the property, although $3 million of that
amount will be returned to the city to aid in the property's cleanup, Timms said.
The new facility south of Ames is intended to replace the Ankeny farm, which
dates to the 1940s, as well as ISU's old dairy farm on the south side of Ames,
which the university closed because of budget cuts.
About 75 people from the university, industry and government attended the April
22 groundbreaking.
"Plans are in place. Some of the site work has been bid out, and we're trying to
get all of the construction of the barns and facilities finalized," said Maynard
Hogberg (pronounced Ho-berg), chairman of Iowa State's Department of
Animal Science.
Timms, an associate professor of dairy science at Iowa State, has been a leader
in the project, serving as liaison with architects and engineers. In the mid- to late
1990s, he and others had crafted a plan to construct a new dairy research facility
at Iowa State, but their proposal lacked funding. Like the project getting under
way this spring, that plan involved merging the two farms in Ankeny and on
Ames' south side and building a state-of-the-art facility.
Although the earlier project failed, it served as a springboard for the new project,
Timms said.
Organizers have scaled back plans because of cost constraints, he said, but the
purpose remains the same: Provide Iowa State students and faculty with a
commercial-size facility that can be modified to accommodate changing industry
practices and research needs, while also serving as a center for improved public
understanding of dairy production.
Although it is far smaller than Iowa's largest commercial dairy operation — a farm
in northwest Iowa with a herd of 6,800 cows — the new Iowa State dairy farm's
herd size is larger than average for Iowa, officials said.
People who have worked on the project could not be happier that it has begun.
"We'll be milking cows there by May of 2007," Timms said.
Design reflects dairy trends
REGULATION: Environmental regulation of U.S. livestock enterprises has
increased in the decade since Iowa State University officials began discussing
construction of a new dairy. So has public scrutiny of the safety and treatment of
farm animals.
IMPACT: Both factors figure prominently in the design of dairy.
BEHAVIOR: Dairy cows' movements, behavior and comfort were factored into
the design, said Leo Timms, ISU Extension dairy specialist in Ames and a key
player in the project's planning. Since the cows spend a lot of time resting
between milkings, it is important to provide comfortable bedding, say dairy
management and health experts.
BEDDING OPTIONS: Commercial dairies often use sand for bedding, although
increasingly, dairy farms use "cow mattresses" made of rubber-filled tubes that
are covered with fabric and other bedding. Sand requires special handling,
Timms said, so the ISU dairy probably will provide mattresses for its cows. Yet
another option is being considered for bedding: dry solids separated from the
cows' waste.
QUOTE: "If you can do that rather than buy semi-loads of bedding, I mean, why
not?" Timms said.