Mark McCormick has watched many of the farms in his community shut down in the past three decades, but McCormick has been determined not to join that fate. It hasn’t been easy, keeping his dairy going. But he and his family have been doing it since 1839, when Christopher McCormick moved to Java, New York, and started farming. That McCormick would leave in the fall to work in New Orleans before returning for the spring planting.
Mark McCormick has been a mainstay at the farm for all 50 of his years. These days he milks 240 cows, has another 218 head of young stock and farms 700 acres. He has seven employees at Mar-Dan Farms.
The farm was recently honored as a “Century Farm,” one of four recognized by the New York State Agricultural Society.
“This is what I was born to do,” McCormick said about his life as a dairy farmer. “I like that nothing is ever the same. I get to see the seasons change.”
McCormick and other dairies are still recovering from a disastrous 2009, when milk prices plunged far below farmers’ production costs. McCormick said the prices need to stay up and stop the deep valleys and brief peaks.
“It would be nice, a lot better if we had a constant price,” he said at the Ag Society meeting in Syracuse, New York. “But you just never know.”
McCormick remembers when there were 13 dairies on a 10-mile stretch of Route 98 between Java Center and Arcade. Now there is zero. In his neighborhood, there were four dairies on Torrey Hill Road in Java. Now there are two.
McCormick said many of the farms that closed lacked a new generation that wanted to take over a business requiring long hours and sometimes no income. Dairies will need steady, profitable prices to have a future, he said.
“With the low prices, you can make more money elsewhere, and you don’t have to work 80 hours a week,” he said.
McCormick was also cited by the Ag Society for his community involvement. He is chairman of the Java Zoning Board of Appeals and chairman of the town’s Assessment Board of Review. He also is a member of St. Patrick’s Church, which was built on land donated by Christopher McCormick.
The Ag Society also recognized the following as century farms: Bowe Farms in Farmington, Ontario County; Kinland Jersey Farm in Marietta, Onondaga County; and Lagoner Farms in Williamson, Wayne County. PD
—From The Daily News
