The Portena family emigrated from Holland in 1988 and set up a dairy business in the Monkton, Ontario, area.

When Cor and Cathy Haagsma, owners of Poly-C Farms in Ponoka, Alberta, built their calf barn in 2015, they strongly considered installing automated feeders. However, they and their employees decided they would miss out on visual contact and inspection too much during feeding calves to make the switch from buckets to auto-feeders.

When Anton Borst’s parents first moved to Halarda Farms in 1984, they had 100 cows, 400 acres and five children. Today, Anton and his wife, Cheryl, own and run the 800-cow, 4,500-acre and 80-head angus/angus-cross operation in Elm Creek, Manitoba, with their nine children.

He’ll soon be 87, but Bruce Witmer hasn’t taken to a rocking chair yet and shows no signs of doing so in the foreseeable future.

Patrick Bos’ family has owned the farm he operates in Ponoka, Alberta, for 47 years. It was a dairy farm until Patrick was 5 years old and the cows were sold. They were replaced by beef cattle and grain crops.

Bridon Farms in Paris, Ontario, is a family operation, including Brian Sayles and his two sons, Bruce and Jeff. Since there is no hired labour, when it came time to make changes on the farm, efficiency and cow comfort were high priorities.