From one milkmaid to another

ST. MARTIN, Minn. — For nearly 60 years, Kolb Dairy was managed by Theresa Kolb. The matriarch of the Kolb family has now passed the torch to her granddaughter, Alayna Kolb.

“As a kid following Grandma around the farm, I learned about cows, and now as an adult, I learned the management side of things from her, too,” Alayna said. “I have learned how to tell when there is something wrong with each cow.”

Alayna took over the role of herdswoman at the family’s 420-cow dairy farm near St. Martin in the fall of 2023. The Kolb Dairy team consists of brothers David, Jason, Leon and Mike, along with David’s wife, Nicole, David’s children, Alayna and Jakob, and Leon’s son, Kyle. They work together in their respective roles to run the family farm.

“I’m really proud of Alayna,” David said. “She has a passion for cows and a big heart; she is a perfect fit for the role. I made sure she knew that she is the one who has to decide if she wants to come back or not.”

Since returning to the home farm, Alayna has been managing the herd of milk cows, dry cows and close-up heifers. She makes breeding decisions, works with their nutritionist and hoof trimmer and manages the farm’s four employees.

“The transition was very easy for me since I have helped Grandma milk the cows since I was a kid,” Alayna said. “I was very familiar with our protocols and how things were done. Now, the biggest thing was having the confidence to be the decision maker because there are a lot of decisions that need to be made.”

Some of those decisions have included the use of sexed semen in the breeding program. Heifers and first- and second-lactation cows are bred with sexed semen for the first two services. After that, they are bred with beef semen. Later lactation cows are bred using beef semen.

“This gives us a much better idea of how many heifers to bull calves we are going to get,” Alayna said. “This, in turn, helps our bull calf buyer plan ahead and (helps) us for housing needs.”

Being of a younger generation and mindset, Alayna has implemented a few changes to her grandmother’s pen and paper record-keeping system.

“As soon as I got here, I worked on getting everything in the computer with our VAS program, and I found that it has really helped our nutritionist and kept our whole team informed with what is going on,” Alayna said. “When I was in college, they stressed that anything medical, unless it was recorded, didn’t happen.”

With an interest in numbers and analytics, Alayna worked with her family to get activity monitors on all the cows.

“Now, my phone can tell me when a cow is not feeling well or is in heat,” Alayna said.

Alayna’s responsibilities on the farm have continued to grow and now include working with youngstock at their heifer site and working in the field when needed.

Growing up on the farm and working with cows and showing horses at the county fair, Alayna always had an interest in large animals. The idea of coming back to the farm had occurred to Alayna, but her dad encouraged her to go to college and try something else for a couple of years, and at the time, there were no full-time positions available.

While in high school, Alayna worked at Lake County Veterinary Services and went on to study veterinary technology at Ridgewater College in Willmar.

“That (program) was a really good thing because I use that knowledge every single day,” Alayna said.

Alayna did an internship with Anoka Equine Veterinary Services in Elk River while in college. She was offered a full-time position with them, but turned it down so she could stay closer to home.

Meanwhile, Theresa, at 76 years old, was going through some health issues and decided to retire from the farm. David asked Alayna if she would be interested in taking over her grandma’s position on the farm.

“It worked out that when I was done with school, Grandma was ready to be done,” Alayna said. “I also really wanted a job where I could dig in deep, more of a manager role and not just an employee.”

Grandma Theresa still plays an active role on the farm by making lunch and dinner for the family, creating a central meeting space each day for everyone to get together and discuss the plans and course of action for the day.

“I am grateful to be working with family because I get to see them every day,” Alayna said. “We have a lot of family members involved in the farm, and we all wouldn’t be able to do what we do without each other there to help and support us.”

David agreed.

“Getting to see and work with my kids and my family every day is pretty cool,” he said.