The Farm

No one seems to know how long the farm has been in Helmut's family--we know that the house is over 300 years old, but whether or not the Kuenzner's were the original owners is a mystery lost in time. Helmut bought the farm from The Count in 1991, and made many changes in his ownership.

The farm was once a traditional Bavarian dairy farm with only about 30 cows. The barn was and still is attached to the house, as is common here. Really, it's not as bad as it sounds. You don't really smell the farm any more than in a Wisconsin farm house where everyone wears their work shoes inside anyways. Now it is filled with beef steers. They call the breed "Flake Fee" and it looks somewhere in between dairy and beef animals. Apparently the breed originated in the Bavarian Alps--Bavarians are very patriotic even in business pursuits and the breed is very common here for beef and dairy farms. There are about 30 of the animals and they are Demeter organic, the strictest organic standard in the world. Jenny and Helmut are not even allowed to dehorn them. While the barn is original, it has had a few updates. It is a free-stall style with the animals being stanchioned only to feed. There is an automated manure scraper which makes the work load very light. Nate and I just have to throw a little straw down in the morning for the mattresses in the back, then later we feed them hay and silage.

They get the animals as bull calves from a dairy farm which they cooperate with. Nate and I have also gone to the dairy farm to help milk. It too is a retrofitted old barn. There are about 40 cows, all Flake-Fee, all organic. The size of the farm is actually on the larger side for southern Germany...there are some larger farms in Northern Germany, but nowhere near American numbers. The Bavarians are astonished when I tell them that I come from an 85-cow farm; they think it must be one of those "factory farms" they hear about...they are even more astonished when I tell them that our farm is on the small side. There is an 8 milker single-side pit parlor which was put in 15 years ago. In general everything is pretty similar to Wisconsin farms, although the cows don't seem to give much milk. The farm-owner was very proud not only of the organic standards, but also that they don't use any genetics-only a couple bulls. (This should explain why the cows don't give much milk).


The two farms not only share animals, but also help out with meat processing. Every 2 months there is a meat Friday when they butcher a couple beef steers and a couple hogs. Nate and I got to participate in the chaos of cutting up, packaging, and sorting the meat for over 90 orders. We had to take an order card and assemble a box of the various types of meat that the customer had requested. Of course, the order was written in German and there were a lot of different cuts of meat to sort through. The farm owners didn't seem to be to concerned about our lack of competency, so we weren't either, but I'm pretty sure that there are going to be a few confused customers...

Jenny and Helmut also care for around 10 horses, some of which are theirs and some of which they raise for other people in exchange for 110E a month rent. Our jobs with the horses are to clean and bed 2 stables and 5 box stanchions, move the horses to different pastures, and feed them. Nate and I are beginning to resent the horses for their lack of contribution to society and willingess to live off the system....we call them "the liberals."

There are also around 30 chickens, which are not much work at all. We just go in a couple times a day, check for eggs, and fill their water.

Other tasks that we do include making breakfast (a mix of apples, oranges, bananas, granola, and yogurt that is sometimes suspiciously chunky), doing dishes (using water warmed on the stove since there is no hot water in the kitchen), setting the table (and we have to make sure that The Count gets his special dishes), and helping to rennovate an old room upstairs.