Farm Horizons
•
Aug. 8, 2016
•
Page 14
Stuewes named Carver County
Farm Family of the Year
BY TOM DIERBERGER
The University of Minnesota Extension office named
the Stuewe family of Cologne as the 2016 Carver County Farm Family of the Year.
The award is annually given to local farm families
around Minnesota. It is presented to families who are
involved in agricultural production and are engaged in
their agricultural communities.
Paul Stuewe and his wife, Sue, have two children, Dan
and Clare. Paul has served on the County Dairy Board
and the Mid-County Coop Board.
Sue has been involved with the Carver County Dairy
Association for six years. The organization represents
farmers in Carver County in parades, hosts food shelves
in June and December, and runs a Dairy Booth each
year at the Carver County Fair.
Dan graduated from Ridgewater College with a concentration in dairy management and currently works
full time on the farm.
Clare will attend South Dakota State University for
nursing in the fall. In high school, she was involved in
the FFA and was named the Carver County Dairy Princess in April.
The Stuewe’s work hard together, which is a necessity
for a family of four as busy as they are.
“We’re all pretty interactive when someone’s gone,”
Sue Stuewe said. “We all fill in for each other. I do a
lot of the milking and feeding the calves, but we all do
whatever needs to be done.”
The farm where the Stuewe family resides and works
on has been in the family for three generations.
“The farm started out in the 1920s,” Paul Stuewe said.
“My grandpa started it and my dad took over shortly
after World War II. I took over in 1991.”
A typical day on the Stuewe farm begins around 6:30
a.m. with milking of their 80 cows. The morning chores
are usually finished around 9:30 a.m.
Then it’s on to the other chores until it’s time for milking cows again at night.
“We basically do just dairy,” Stuewe said. “There
will be some grain to sell, but not a whole lot. Most
of the acreage covers feed, since we’re milking roughly