News

Ask Matt ... who's got milk

Bradley Johnston is operating a new dairy in Mills River.

By Matt Matteson, Published: February 1, 2017

Q. What are they doing with that land on N.C. 191 next to the Mills River Town Hall? And what are those round structures in the middle of the fields?

That land is being prepared for Henderson County’s newest dairy and those round structures are for irrigating what will soon be grass. The 35-acre dairy is operated by Bradley Johnston, a third-generation dairy farmer who owns the Mills River Creamery just up the road. His dairy products will be sold through the family business.
To get the dairy started, Johnston bought 30 Jersey dairy cattle from Biltmore Farms. He will eventually double that herd. Cattle don’t come cheap and Jerseys start at around $1,300 and go up from there depending on age, pedigree and milk production. Johnston’s cows now produce 175 gallons of milk per day and they will rotate among three outdoor paddocks (enclosed grazing areas). Johnston has an underground irrigation system for the grass drawing water from the Mills River but the cattle will drink well water.
Johnston has done a good bit of research on milk before embarking upon this venture. Gee, how much science can there be in the dairy business you might ask? Well, for starters, one in four Americans suffers from lactose intolerance and for some time consumers in New Zealand and Australia have been drinking a brand of milk called “A2” with good results. You see, most of what we have been buying is A1 milk that carries a protein less easily digested than that produced by A2 cows. Holstein cows for example, produce A1 milk which is the milk of choice of dairy farmers because the cows produce a lot of it. To put an A2 label on a quart of milk, Johnston has to have his cattle DNA tested plus jump through legal hoops. The Creamery’s milk products are pasteurized and also labeled “RBGH Free” which means the cows are not injected with a genetically engineered artificial hormone to increase milk production.
What is significant about Bradley Johnston’s dairy is that the dairy industry had almost left the county after the 200-plus acre Taproot Dairy on Butler Bridge Road recently closed. Taproot, which Bradley ran with brothers Billy and Timmy and sister Mary Louise Corn, has been considered for many years as a prime industrial site. Now the oldest dairy is Small Acres Dairy on Jeffress Road in Mills River, which has a connection to the Johnston family. It’s operated by Mike Corn, Mary Louise Corn’s husband. Mark Williams, who heads the county’s agribusiness development office, said that there were once some 200 dairies in the county. “I remember back in 1987 the number was down to just sixteen dairies,” said Williams. “We were just down to one so it’s good to keep dairies in the county.” On the agritourism side, Williams was upbeat. “Johnston’s dairy will be open to the public and the milking parlor will employ glass tubes where one can follow the flow of milk from the cow’s udders into the containment jars. This will be a great experience for school kids and adults alike.”
Dairy farming is hanging on in Henderson County. Got milk?

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