Six trays rest on six tables in a room that resembles any other biology lab. Six cow reproductive tracts lie in each tray, surrounded by a mixture of formaldehyde and iodine. Students hover over each tray, poking and prodding the tract in order to guess the stage of pregnancy of each calf. Shrieks and peals of laughter pierce the air.
\I can feel a hoof!"" Dana Borchardt squeals as she pinches a particularly veiny part of the tract.
Dana is one of about 120 students who arrive on the Madison campus in November only to depart in March, two months earlier than their counterparts. They are part of the Short Course Farm and Industry program, a 120-year program run through the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.
Started in 1885, the short course program teaches the skills necessary to work in agribusiness.
""[The program] centers... on actual production agriculture,"" said Ted Helbach, a Dairy Genetics and Evaluation instructor. ""The majority of kids are going to go back out and work immediately, so the classes are very hands on.""
Running from November until March, the months are chosen in order to avoid the harvest season on most farms.
""The [classes'] time coincides with people not doing fieldwork,"" Helbach said. ""If you're going to leave the farm, now's the time to do it.""
Short course students can choose from a variety of classes ranging from Dairy Herd Management to Grain Marketing to Farm Machinery. The students can also chose whether to follow one of the six specified tracks in the program or merely complete courses pertaining to their interests.
Growing up on a dairy farm outside of Wausau, Wis., Dana always knew she wanted to be a dairy farmer. She started helping her family with morning chores when she was five by feeding the many cats that roamed her family's farm. By eight she was feeding?? calves with a bottle.
Unlike her younger brother and sister, Borchardt rarely needed any prompting to do her work.
""The thing is, they're not really into the farming business,"" she said. ""So they're like, 'I don't want to do this, I don't want to do that,' so I have to do everything they don't want to do.""
Dana readily admits dairy farming is not a popular career track. Out of a high school population of 1,200 and a class size of 400, only about 25 students actually enjoyed dairy farming or the business itself, she said.
Farm management classes offered through the short course program are required of all students following a specialized track and emphasize the growing difficulties of managing any farm, regardless of type. Milk prices have fallen $3 per ton, from $14 to $11, which has a substantial effect on the management of a dairy farm, and, Dana admits, turns some from the industry.
Yet, Dana cannot imagine doing anything else.
""I actually love the animals and working with them,"" she said, laughing. ""Well, not maybe always working with them-you get mad at them every now and then. It's just fun working with them, and even though they are animals, they do listen to me, I think anyway. They come up and lick you or suck on you or bump you or rub up against you, and that shows they like you.""
Cow affection, however, can be a little overwhelming, a little over affectionate and can contain a little too much saliva.
""If they slobber on?? you, it gets really gooey and gross. Like if they suck on you long enough, your sweatshirt will get wet, just like if you took a shower and only part of you got wet,"" she said.
Close interaction with dairy cows is something Dana values highly, and turns her away from the steady trend toward larger herds on dairy farms. Whereas a typical dairy farm has about 100 to 150 cows on it, there are an increasing number of farms that contain upwards of 500 cows, with some having as many as a few thousand.
""If you get into bigger dairy farming, it kind of ruins the point of dairy farming, for me anyway,"" she said. ""If you get too large, then you won't understand what you're doing. You won't run your business as well as if you had a smaller herd.""
Yet, there are some drawbacks to working so closely with a large number of animals, especially animals that must be milked every 12 hours.
""It gets annoying sometimes. Getting up one time and being here and being there, and you have to be home in time to milk your cows. You don't have much of a social life,"" Dana said.
Dana's daily life differs drastically from the average UW-Madison student. When most students have hit their snooze button seven times before a 9:55 a.m. class, Borchardt has been up since 7:15 a.m., and has already attended two classes.
""The first few days you're like, 'Oh my gosh, am I going to the right class? Is anybody actually here?'"" she said, noting the lack of students roaming the campus in the morning hours. ""And then you find out there's people.""
The courses in the program have been extremely helpful to Dana, who decided to attend the school at UW based on the closeness of the campus to her home, from which she commutes on the weekends in order to work on both her and her boyfriend's farms. The courses focus on the skills necessary to run a successful dairy farm, and, she said, are what she wants to learn about. Within the year, Dana will have acquired all she needs to run a farm, and will not be returning for another year.
""My parents are thinking retirement already,"" she said. ""It's kind of nice to know that, but in another way they're like, 'Yup, you get to do this, you get to take over the farm and do this,' and it's like OK... I'm?? not even 20 and you're telling me to take over a dairy farm.""
Yet, despite her hesitation to immediately take over a farm, Dana never showed any form of hesitation at jumping into the industry when she was little; rather, she never showed any hesitation at familiarizing herself with barns. When she was little, she spent a lot of time in barns, sleeping on hay bales and feed sacks.
""My family actually has pictures of me doing that,"" she said, laughing and taking a sip of milk.
