[cock-a-doodle-doo]
[moooo]
- C'mon girls. Let's go.
[moo]
Get in there.
We're on the cows' routine.
Seven days a week. Five o'clock. Morning and night.
And they let you know if you're ten minutes late,
they're bellowing at you.
- For Mike and Jamie Henschel and their three boys,
milking time is often family time.
Jamie tries to appreciate it,
since two of her sons have jobs off the farm.
[cluck, cluck]
- Early morning's my best time.
I mean, the sun just peeking up,
it's peaceful.
It's calm.
- Most people think a chore
is something that's dull and repetitive
but farm chores give you eggs for breakfast.
[sizzling]
- We know no different; it's always been that way.
- Mike and Jamie were born into farming,
as were most of their ancestors.
Mike says the Henschel family came to Door County
a century ago, drawn by cheap land prices.
- My great-grandpa Ed and Mary moved up here
from Elkhart Lake area in 1902.
I think 12 cows, something like that
that great-grandpa had had back then.
Eighty acres.
My grandpa Ray took it over at the age of 18.
He had four children, and one son.
That was my dad Roger.
And he ran it.
And then in 2000...
- 2000 we purchased it.
- Me and Jaime took the farm over from my parents.
- Jamie grew up on a farm down the road.
They were kindred spirits growing up
in an era when more and more of their classmates
had no connection to farm life.
- We knew what to talk about.
It was always what crop you're raising
or how's harvesting going.
I was 13 years old when I took the pigs over.
That's when my dad had his first heart attack.
And that pig smell, you can't get off your hands.
I mean, you'd wash them.
So I'd soak my hands in aftershave lotion,
and try to cover up the smell.
I always says Jaime's the only girl
I found that could handle the pig smells.
- I grew up on a farm.
It's the natural aroma.
[slosh, slosh]
We married two years out of high school,
and stayed right on this farm.
And helped his parents out until we took it over
and started raising our own family.
- Despite the chores and the routine of the animals,
Mike and Jamie say there's always something new on the farm.
- Just a little bit of a diversion.
I mean, something different in the day.
- That's because they do more than cows and corn.
- We tap about 1200 trees.
- They cook and bottle their own maple syrup.
They have bees for their own brand of honey.
And because they're in Door County,
they have a small cherry orchard.
- This year will be 89 years the cherry orchard's been there.
- And in case that wasn't enough,
they also operate a sawmill.
- Jaime saws a little over 200,000 board feet a year.
So now we call farming our hobby
and the sawmill is our main job.
- Add it all up and it's enough for a family farmer to get by.
- Having the sawmill, all our diversification
really helps out, kind of offset, and family labor.
I mean, you don't count your hours.
- Mike and Jamie were born into farming
but they made a choice to stay on the farm.
A choice their boys will have to make as well.
- It's been in his family.
We're fourth generation.
Our boys will be fifth.
We're hoping.
I mean just like my dad was hoping I'd take the farm over.
And I'm pretty sure our boys will be taking this over
'cause they seem to like it so far.
- After all, it's not a chore if you enjoy what you're doing.
- Always liked it.
Always will.
- Dad always says,
"Work is something you don't enjoy."
So hopefully, I never have to work.
[chuckles]