The owners of Northern Plains — one of the largest dairies in the state — are planning to add another similar size dairy nearby.

The new dairy would have an affiliation with the University of Minnesota’s veterinary medicine college, allowing students to stay at the dairy while they train.

“The beauty of this operation is that it’s commercial success means private investment will pay for it and the university just has to invest in the educational side of it,” said Mitch Davis of Davis Family Dairies.

The project will cost $15 million.

Trevor Ames, interim dean of the college of veterinary medicine, said the affiliation is a good fit for them because the Davis family has a large successful dairy operation as well as related processing companies.

The family operates Davisco, an international food business.

“This exposes our students to on-farm conditions. They get exposure to a lot of the routine things that happen on a large commercial dairy and a lot of the routine treatments,” Ames said.

The new dairy would be near New Sweden in Nicollet County, about 15 miles northwest of St. Peter. The Davis’ Northern Plains dairy, opened in 2003, is a few miles west of St. Peter off Highway 99.

The new dairy would milk 3,000 cows (the same as Northern Plains) but would also have a calving section where about 6,000 calves would be born annually. Davis hopes the barn is open a year from now.

Permit process ahead

Davis already received a variance from the county to exceed the county’s animal unit maximum of 3,000. The Board of Adjustments granted Davis a variance allowing for 4,500 animal units. (An animal unit roughly equals one adult cow.)

The higher number of animals is needed to provide cows at various ages for veterinary students to work on.

Ames said it’s important for students to work on animals at all ages.

The bull calves will be sold and heifer calves will be kept on site for 5 to 7 months before being sent to a farm in southwestern Minnesota that Davis contracts with to raise them.

Davis and the university are now designing the building and starting work on an Environmental Assessment Worksheet.