Saturday, September 12th, 2015 – St. Joe, Missouri
Howdy friends and family! What a trip so far! Today we started our day off relatively early to head out to the stop I looked forward to the most, and boy was it all that I had hoped for and more. I know, I know, you’re anxiously waiting for me to spill the beans! Shatto Milk Company was the name of the dairy farm we toured today, let me just say it was great! To start the tour off we were shown first the parlor, a double – six – herringbone parlor, much like the dairies I am most familiar with. Our tour guide walked us through the milking process which is much like ours however, I found it interesting that they actually use a sanitizer for the initial cleaning of the teat instead of a ‘pre’ iodine dip; the reason was because the sanitizer could actually clean 3x as fast as the ordinary post dip.. Ya learn somethin new every day!
Next on the tour, students were able to “hand milk” a cow if they wanted to, and interact with a few heifer calves. Most people got a kick out of this stop! It was very interesting to me that of all of the animals on the farm 95% were black and white Holsteins (some were red) and the remaining population were jersey crossbreds; this was extremely interesting to me as Oregon and California are starting to really turn towards the use of Jerseys as studies are showing they are more economical and more efficient. Maybe some day Missouri will catch up!
After touring the rest of the facility including the milk room it was obvious to me that Shatto was started out of pure love for the industry and I feel that it is still ran because of that very reason. We had the honor of meeting the manager of the farm, and the owner of the company which were both very kind men. To conclude the tour we were given samples of their products which included cheese curds (cajon, dill and regular), butter (honey, original and garlic) and a variety of their specialty milks: root beer, cotton candy, chocolate peanut butter, coffee, chocolate, banana, strawberry and cookies and cream! I have never tasted such yummy varieties of milk, however I still think that our local dairy, Bennett Family Farms may have them beat with their chocolate milk!
After touring the dairy we took off for Schweizer Orchards in St. Joe, MO. I had never been to a place like this: an apple orchard, pumpkin growing, christmas tree farm and kiddie maize. What a unique place! We were toured by the Co-Owner on a ‘tractor hay ride’ which no hay was involved in. According to our guide, due to liability with the farm they no longer used hay as it was too dangerous! It was very interesting to hear that the number one problem with the business was liability, but I believe it! The population is very sue-happy! I really enjoyed this tour because it was relaxed, fun and exciting to talk to such a passionate man that really spoke with honesty. We were hand picked the Missouri apple, the Jonathon and were encouraged to chuck it from the hay ride. What a great atmosphere and tour! 
On a random note, we learned that Christmas trees in Missouri aren’t naturally green…. they have a worker go through and actually spray them before the U-pick season! How crazy, but how brilliant!
Lastly, we toured around St. Joe, and came across the old Livestock Exchange building; what a neat place! Inside there were pictures of what St. Joe looked like before the building burnt down, and they actually had livestock all around the town! Buildings that surrounded it where actually once livestock holding pens, slaughter houses and meat packing plants! What a monument!
Stay tuned for more updates from just another woman in agriculture and my fellow 15 peers as we take on the Midwest! Oh, I almost forgot to mention, we technically were in Kansas today; we found a field nearest the Missouri/Kansas border where horses greeted us as we stepped foot on Kansas land.
