Lilley Farms adds new technology, natural beef to farm operations

Houlton Pioneer Times photo/Gloria Austin
NEW TECHNOLOGY — Jim Lilley demonstrates how the new feeding system for calves works on the Lilley Farms in Smyrna.
By Gloria Austin
Staff Writer
    SMYRNA — Combining both dairy and beef, the Lilley Farms on Smyrna Center Road under second generation owners, Jim and Perry Lilley, has continued to diversify to meet the ever-changing climate of farming in Aroostook County.
    The farm was started in 1946 by Burns Lilley and his wife Juanita, after he came home from serving in World War II. The couples’ youngest son Perry joined his father in 1971 after graduating from the University of Maine with a degree in agriculture engineering. Jim, who completed his degree at the University of Maine in 1969, returned to full-time farming in 1974 after a stint in the United States Coast Guard.
    Lilley Farms, Inc. was incorporated in 1980 and its dairy operation has a 140 cow Holstein milking herd, which is one of two local farms (Cowperthwaite Farms) serving to supply Houlton Farms Dairy. The cows are milked twice a day in a double-seven herringbone parlor, with the herd averaging 23,000 pounds of milk per cow per year.
    Along with milk cows, the Lilleys raised feeder cows, which they sold to an auction barn in Turner. But, prices were becoming “ridiculously low” making it not worth hauling the baby calves down. So, the Lilley brothers decided to raise and keep their herd and sell feeder calves themselves.
Houlton Pioneer Times photo/Gloria Austin
SHY — This calf on the Lilley Farms in Smyrna is a bit camera shy, as he backs away from the new feeding system when the camera flashes. The new technology has cut down on labor.
    “The cows would get 500 to 600 pounds and we’d sell them to a feed lot,” Jim explained. “In the fall of the year, we’d go to an auction and a lot of the cows ended up going to Iowa. Well, we figured if they can fatten steer in Iowa, we can fatten steer in Maine.”
    That was the beginning of Lilley Farms Natural Holstein Beef division.
    As the Lilleys started growing their own feeder cows, the Department of Agriculture chose the farm for a research project.
    “They wanted to know if you could take a holstein and make him so he’s grade, prime or choice,” Jim said. “Prime is the best then choice and select cuts.”
    The pilot project funneled the cows through Wolfneck Farms, now called Pineland, because they had a transportation network.
    “The cows had to be shipped to a graded slaughterhouse and the only one where they grade meat is in Pennsylvania,” said Jim. “We ended up shipping 40 down and 38 were graded prime and choice. It’s a very lean meat, but it’s very tasty.”
    Today, Lilley Farms sends their naturally-raised beef to a Maine Department of Agriculture inspected facility in West Gardiner and it is shipped home by Cowperthwaite Farms trucks. The meat comes frozen and vacuum sealed.
    Lilley Farms markets their natural beef — which means no antibiotics or hormone implants are used, but it is not organic because the Lilleys grow their crops using herbicides — by word of mouth, which is the most popular; adverstising in the local paper and through their web site www.lilleyfarmsnaturalbeef.com.
    A half cow can cost around $1,000 to purchase, but the Lilleys try to sell their beef in a convenient way.
    “An average family doesn’t want to put that amount of money out all at once,” Jim said. “What this slaughterhouse does is it takes a half of a cow and does all the cuts from steaks to hamburg. They divide it equally.”
     Before the beginning of the year, feeding calves were fed twice a day until the Lilleys purchased a computerized calf feeder.
    “We had always fed the cows by hand,” said Jim. “They take two quarts of powdered milk in the morning and two at night. That was the standard.”
    The Lilleys calves were housed in individualized pens, with buckets for each calf. For example, for 30 calves, 30 batches of feed had to be mixed.
    Pointing at the machine, Jim said, “This takes the place of that. This is relatively new technology for the United States. It is very popular in the European countries.”
    At the time the technology was installed on Lilley Farms around the first of the year, Jim thought it was only the third of its kind in the state. Opening the round top, the milk powder, which comes in a bag for $60 is poured into the machine.
    “We just need to remember to keep it full,” Jim said. “It takes one bag a day and it really works good,” he said.
    The computerized feeding machine is set up using two feeding stations and a handheld digital reader displays all the information about each calf needed to watch their development.
    “Each calf is identified by a chip in its ear,” Jim explained. “The reader tells me if he is or isn’t entitled to more feed.”
    For example, a calf came to feed and Jim punched enter to find out how this little one was doing. The reader showed he was in F1 (first feeding station) his number was 71 and the readout showed he couldn’t have any more to eat.
    “He’s done to a predetermined time,” Jim said. “He could suck there all day long and not get anything. That way the calf doesn’t overfeed.”
Houlton Pioneer Times photo/Gloria Austin
PUMPS — The new feeding system at Lilley Farms pumps out just the right portion of milk needed for the feeding calves.
    Calves are gradually weaned from milk to solid food. The reader numbers showed that another calf in F2 – feeder two – was on a downward slant in his feed ration.
    “The programming of the computer accelerates the amount of milk, plateaus and then gradually weans them off at end of two months,” said Jim.
    Before leaving the feeding station, the calves are on solid food. But after the computer has weaned them off milk, every time they go up to the sensor to feed, they will get only water.
    “They won’t go cold turkey, as the machine keeps pushing the feed down,” said Jim . “That way it isn’t such a big shock when they are weaned … that is the purpose behind it.”
    The digital readout also helps the Lilleys discover calves which aren’t feeling well and they go check them physically.
    “It’s quite a tool,” added Jim.   
    The feeding machine automatically cleans itself. It is all sanitary. The only manually cleaning is with soapy water on the dribble trough cup.
    “Once a day we go in and wash it all out,” Jim said.
    The feeding machine sends the milk through tubing to the open feeding stations, while the calves are in a greenhouse. The feeding cup has an opening around it where warm air from the gas-heated room escapes so that in cold weather, any fluid within the cup will drain out and not freeze.
    At this time of year when the Lilleys are busy harvesting alfalfa and finishing their planting, Jim said the thought of having to come in and feed 30 calves in the past was overwhelming. But not with this system.
    “It has really cut down on a lot of labor,” Jim said. “ Now, I just have to check the screen. I just love it.”
    The greenhouse is an open area with two long group pens.
    “We had the capacity for 30 individual pens,” said Jim. “Now, we can take more animals and make them comfortable in a smaller space.”
    Jim scoops up a handful of crushed barley and soy meal and sifts it through his fingers.
    “This is the grain mix the calves eat for six months along with hay,” he said. “Then they eat grass silage, along with barley and soy meal. The steers eat corn silage, oats, soy meal and culled potatoes and then they go out  and lay down on a sawdust patch.”
    The Lilleys haul in little kiln-dried shavings because they absorb a lot of moisture and it smells good, too.
    Then turning, Jim points at the second pen of larger calves.
    “The white tags are bulls and the yellow are females,” he said. “These are the beginning of the beef. Fifteen months from now and they will be full grown, weighing around 1,500 pounds live weight from a 100-pound calf.”
      “We have 300 head,” Jim said looking over the barned animals.
    The Lilleys own two farms on the Smyrna Center Road and then they rent or own farmland in Ludlow and New Limerick where they plant their feed crops. They have fields of soy beans, alfalfa, barley and corn silage which they rotate each year.
    “Over the last three years, we used no till equipment,” Jim said. “We don’t use any conventional tillers like harrows. The equipment is a series of disks in front of the seeder that prepares a little seed bed, but does not disturb the whole regiment of soil down deep.”
    Jim said the only way to use no-till equipment is on flat planting surfaces.
    “You can’t do it on a potato field,” he said. “You have to have a flat planting surface, and get rid of the rows.”
    Lilley Farms has continued to modify their crops and find other ways to keep their farm in business.
    “It’s been going relatively well,” Jim said.
    To order or inquire about pricing of natural Holstein beef, call Jim at 757-8470 or Perry at 757-8570.