“I know that down inside of me, I just want to farm.”

Charity Wampole got her first show heifer in 2016.

“I just want to milk cows and always have a career where I'm surrounded by cows,” Wampole said. Now a college student, she brought three heifers to the Pennsylvania Farm Show the second week of January.

"But I know that the way this industry works, that may not happen.”

Her family owns land in Bradford county, and have bought—then sold—dairy herds twice in the past 8 years. The first sale was because of a family medical accident. The second time?

“In the fall of 2022, we went right back into it. Things were good for about a year,” Wampole said. “[But] because of declining milk prices, we sold out again.”

For decades, the United States has seen agriculture outputs increase, but the number of farms decrease. That holds true for the Commonwealth too.

“It's the middle sized farms that are being the most squeezed,” Tim Kelsey said, an agricultural economics professor for Pennsylvania State University.

Over 88% of Pennsylvania farms are classified as “small” by the USDA. That means they sell less than $350,000 a year. The sell point does not indicate profit (what they sell then has to pay for their feed, utilities, equipment, transportation, etc). Most small farms operate to supplement a families income or as hobby farms. It’s not uncommon for small farms to not break even for their expenses.

“Farming provides real enjoyment and satisfaction, bringing a quality of life to the families involved,” Kelsey said.

But for the family farms who want to keep their farm as the primary source of income, challenges arise.

The cost to run a farm—feed, utilities, transportation—keeps going higher. Also, cow genetics are better. Less cows are making more milk as farms stay selective with breeding. Needing less cows can translate to needing less farms, especially as larger farms can manage increasing herds.

In all this, demand for milk fluctuates, which makes milk prices go up and down. For farmers like Wampole, who had a 40 cow herd…

“There's still a lot of time requirement. So you need somebody who's doing a lot of work— close to full time if not not full time. But the operation is not large enough to be able to bring in sufficient income from family to survive,” Kelsey said.

The instability forces family farms to get big… or sell out.

“It's actually crazy to me how many other people who had dairies and now just.. show,” Wampole said.

Mid-sized dairy farms are putting solutions to work. Some have embraced farm to table market trends to skip middle man food processors… thus keeping more profit.

Wampole is studying agriculture in college. She says the educational journey has helped her see there are more occupations in this field than just dairy farming.

Still, for daughters of farmers like Charity, who want to walk the path they grew up in but are overwhelmed by a tough industry;

seeing other smaller dairies succeed sparks hope.

“Small farms are like the backbone of like this country,” Wampole said, "and I feel like that's why we need them. They give that sense of like family and community.”