Mud Is Spoiling Milk Production in Region

Southern California’s dairy industry is stuck in the mud.

Torrents of rain this month have soaked into piles of manure, leaving about 300,000 dairy cows, calves and other cattle in the Chino Valley mired in so much muck that exhausted and sick animals are dying at three times the normal rate, an industry trade group says.

The waterlogged mess “acts like a giant sponge and expands,” said Nathan de Boom, assistant manager of the Milk Producers Council in Chino. “The cows have to drag through that muck to the feed and the milk barn, and they are tired and losing weight.”

The quagmire will cost dairy farmers about $40 million this month in lost cows and milk production and extra labor to manage the animals and control manure-tainted runoff, industry officials say. That adds up to a significant chunk of the region’s $700-million annual milk production, which accounts for about one-sixth of California’s $4 billion in milk and cream production.

The dairy industry’s economic injuries tell only part of the story of the financial consequences of this winter’s storms: Jack Kyser, chief economist for the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp., estimated that they could cause as much as $500 million in damage to the Southern California economy.

For cows, the weather has been a particular problem. They need dry ground where they can lie down and rest. Surrounded by mud, the bovines tend to stand around, which wears them out and increases their chances of catching pneumonia and other illnesses.

“Normally, I have one to two cows a month die” out of 2,000 animals, said Art Marquez Jr., a third-generation dairyman whose family operates two farms in the area.

“But now I am approaching losing one a day.”

Marquez and other members of the Milk Producers Council are gathering statistics on the losses at the request of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

The trade group hopes to obtain federal aid for dairies in Riverside and San Bernardino counties.

Chino dairy farmer Sybrand Vander Dussen figures that weight loss and stress have cut his milk cows’ production more than a gallon a day. At the prevailing farm price of $1.23 a gallon, that amounts to a loss of almost $2,500 a day from his 2,000-cow herd.

The effects on the retail price and availability of milk should be minimal. Dairies in the Central Valley and other areas where rainfall has been lighter are making up for the dip in Southern California production.

The state has plenty of cows to spare: California’s 1.2 million milk cows produce 4.1 billion gallons annually, according to the California Department of Food and Agriculture, more than any other state.

Although all dairies are more prepared to control farm runoff than they were in the last rain crisis -- the El Nino storms of 1998 -- those in Southern California are used to dry conditions and simply weren’t ready for the type of storms that come once or twice in a hundred years, Vander Dussen said.

“What we really need is a week of good weather,” he said. “It is awful seeing the cows suffer as they are.”

With dry weather, the animals that survive will bounce back, but Vander Dussen is worried about another storm that could hit Southern California next week.

“A lot of the dairies have ponds and berms that are overflowing, and you have manured water going into the streets,” Vander Dussen said. “They can’t hold any more.”

Wet roads and mud are causing additional problems for the industry.

Over in San Jacinto, dairyman Sid Sybrandy said he had only a six-day supply of hay left to feed his animals and worried about getting more.

“Things are so wet the hay trucks can’t get in or out of Blythe and the Imperial Valley, where it is grown,” he said. “We really want winter to end in a big way.”