Who: Peter and Tammie Eldred

What: Lost Creek Dairy

Where: Roggen, CO

East to West: The Trail to Colorado

"My dad started our family farm in 1974 milking 40 cows near Cayuga, NY," Peter Eldred says. "Now we have two main dairies there, milking a total of 5,050 cows."

The Eldred family in western New York State also farms about 7,400 acres and has partnerships in another dairy and a trucking company. Having helped to found Cayuga Marketing and Cayuga Ingredients, the family corporation now is involved in building a milk processing plant.

Some years ago, however, Peter got restless. He imagined wider vistas, a farther horizon. He and spouse Tammie started looking for new opportunities to expand the Eldred family dairy operations.

"I don't know whether it was a mid-life crisis for me or what," he says, "but we started looking west."

The long-term growth opportunity for dairy production in eastern Colorado appealed to the Eldreds. Peter noted that the fluid milk market was shrinking in the Northeast and across the country. He figured the milk price eventually would equalize between the states, so dairying in Colorado, not far from major metro areas on the Eastern Slope of the Rockies, offered a number of advantages.

Roggen, the Eldreds discovered, has a climate that is generally dry and mild with warm summers and relatively mild winters: "Awesome cow weather."

Roggen is less than 50 miles northeast of Denver on I-76 in Weld County, one of the nation's richest ag counties with population growth of 3-4% per year for the past two decades. By contrast, Cayuga County in the Finger Lakes region of western New York has been losing population at the rate of 1-2% per year.

Weld County already is Colorado's leading producer of cattle, grain, and sugar beets, and, with half the state's dairy cattle, it's a growing power in milk production.

"Compared to New York," Peter says, "Colorado is the wild, wild west. It's a great area for both dairy farming and raising a family -- quality dairy operations and good schools.

The Eldreds found the Lost Creek Dairy and first leased it, figuring to bring in their cows, hire their local team, learn about dairying in Colorado, and refine the management system. While still living in New York, they hired a local manager, Mike Edmunds.

"Mike originally came from New York, too," Peter says, "but he's been out here in Colorado many years already. He's been crucial for the successful day-to-day management of the dairy."

A little over two years ago, the Eldreds brought 1,000 heifers from Cayuga to Lost Creek. Then last year there were great opportunities to buy quality Holstein genetics out of California.

"Lots of guys were switching from Holsteins to Jerseys," Peter says. "So we were lucky to be able to buy great cattle at low prices. We sourced 70-80% of our heifers from elite genetic herds. We bought a lot as babies, pre-breeding, and so had to raise them.

"At the time," he says, "we thought we might be in trouble because we had higher feed costs in them. But it worked out great. We've had real good results."

Currently, Lost Creek Dairy milks 2,500 cows in a 100-unit rotary DeLaval parlor. Cow housing includes both free stalls and dry lots. The Eldreds raise all calves to weaning age then send them to nearby heifer growers. They source genetics from Select Sires, ABS, and Genex.

Altogether, Tammie says, Lost Creek has 42 employees, many of whom are bilingual in Spanish and English.

The Eldreds feed a TMR (total mixed ration) year-round. The TMR can include corn silage, dry hay, triticale silage, canola, steam-flaked corn, distillers, wheat hulls, and wet brewers grains (from the Budweiser brewery in Fort Collins, about 70 miles away). The TMR always includes Diamond V Original XPC^TM.

The farm also has some tillable ground that currently is custom-farmed. Peter says there's room to grow Lost Creek Dairy to 6,000 cows.

"Our biggest challenge," Peter says, "is the same for any new dairy -- profitability. It's a big payment book."

So, is moving west to dairy in Colorado a cure for mid-life crisis in New York?

"Could be," Peter laughs. "I'm too busy to think about anything else. We enjoy it here and I don't think the cows could be happier."

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