Haas family to host 43rd Colby Dairy Breakfast

By Neal Hogden

For the second time, the family of Jeremy and Katie Haas will be welcoming FFA and dairy farm supporters to the Colby Dairy Breakfast. The event will be held on Sunday, June 23 from 7 a.m. to noon at their farm which is located at 224547 Dill Creek Lane, approximately four miles east of Colby.

The Haas family has paired technology with an already successful dairy farm to form a modern farm in an efficient man ner. Jeremy Haas, studied engineering after graduating from Colby High School in 2002. He graduated from UW-Platteville and began working at an engineering firm based out of Baraboo.

When he decided he wasn’t as hands-on as he would have liked while working for the engineering firm, he decided the best way to be more hands-on with farming was to own one himself. In 2009, Jeremy bought his father’s farm east of Colby. Jeremy’s parents, Leonard and Mary Haas, started the farm in the mid 1970s and Jeremy and his siblings grew up working on the farm. A love for agriculture isn’t only on Jeremy’s side of the family. In 2011, Katie served as Wisconsin’s 64th Alice in Dairyland. She grew up on her family’s farm and participated in 4-H. She then went on to UW-River Falls and graduated with degrees in agricultural education and mathematics.

In 2016, the family made the switch to robotic milking systems which have pro- vided the Haas's with more efficiency and

profitability. The experiment worked well and in the last five years, two more robotic milkers have been installed on the farm.

Today, Katie and Jeremy raise four children, Emma, 8, Kaden, 7, Landon, 4 and Korbin, 1, on their 500-acre farm.

They have a total of four robot milkers and they milk 200 cows daily. Katie will be starting her first year of teaching at St. Mary School in the fall after teaching at Edgar for the last 12 years.

Katie said herself and Jeremy wanted to ensure the farm was appealing to their children or an outside buyer as they, and the farm, got older and looked to sell it. That was part of the motivation to upgrade the technology on the farm.

“Part of the reason we went to robots was to have an operation that was viable for one of our future kiddos to potentially take over or for somebody else to take over,” she said. “Hopefully, it’ll be one of the kids, but if not, the farm will be appealing to someone else who wants to get into it.”

The 43rd Colby FFA Alumni and Supporters Dairy Breakfast will feature plenty of fun for the whole family. The event will include a meal which will contain pancakes, Smith Bros. sausage, cups of applesauce, cheese curds, cookies, chocolate and white milk, coffee, real maple syrup, butter and ice cream.

The maple syrup will be donated by the host family as a special “thank you” for all those who attend. The event will also feature Wisconsin favorites in the form of Kwik Trip milk and Culver’s custard. The event will also feature a petting zoo, bouncy house, face painting, polka music and tours of the barn. The farm tours are available for anyone interested in seeing the farm’s robotic milking system.

Attendees are strongly encouraged to use the shuttle buses provided by Burnett Transit as the on-site parking is very limited. The buses will be taking guests from the Colby High School parking lot to the Haas farm.

Katie said she has been putting together an educational presentation that will be on display at the breakfast about the farm and its robotics.

“A lot of people have experience with more of a traditional farm,” Katie said. “We’re trying to explain what’s happening on our farm as more people get removed from agriculture. We’re trying to do a little more educational stuff for people.”

She said there will be people available to answer any questions attendees might have about the robotics system or how the farm works while walking through the barns.

Jeanie Tesch of the Colby FFA Alumni said monetary donations are up this year, and the alumni are thankful for the community support they have received, but she is always looking for help in the form of volunteers. If you’re interested in picking up a shift during the 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. shift, reach out to Tesch at 715-223-5182.

THE COLBY HOSTS - The Haas family will be opening up their farm to dairy breakfast attendees on June 23. Jeremy and Katie, along with their children from left to right, Landon, Kaden, Emma and Korbin, will be hosting the breakfast for the second time.

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