Family-centered Farm Growth: Country Sunrise Creamery, Meyerstown, PA Owned and operated by the Nelson Martin Family

By Amy Anselm, NODPA Contributing Writer, of Tioga Family Farm, Truxton, NY

Nelson Martin is the only son of dairy farmers with nine children of his own – and that family dynamic has long been the driver of Country Sunrise Creamery’s generational evolution and continued growth. The farm began as a traditional dairy, over time has dabbled in conventional confinement operations, and more recently has invested in silvopasture and regenerative agriculture practices to arrive at their current system: not-quite-100% grass-fed, not-quite-organic, but perfectly balanced for their family’s goals and values. Today the farm sells raw milk from a milking herd of 35 cows, operates a farm stand, and recently launched a commercial-scale poultry production facility, all on a total of 120 acres.

“I was born on this farm,” Nelson shares, “and my parents milked traditionally for over 30 years.” The family began to transition management in 2004 when Nelson began to take leadership. “When I bought in, I had the mindset that the farm that was the biggest and best and fastest and smartest would be the one that would make it,” Nelson says. “Then I realized that approach is a wild treadmill that just leads to requiring more expansion just to survive.” In 2006 they started looking outside of the conventional approach for other opportunities to build and sustain farming operations without such a breakneck speed of physical expansion.

“We got a raw milk permit in 2006 as an offramp to having to keep growing our herd and operation,” he shares. “We wanted to keep it a family business.” When they first started selling raw milk as a value-added product, they were able to continue shipping the bulk of their milk to Land O’Lakes. As they grew away from the expansion mindset, they began looking more seriously at the values of locally-sourced products for their growing consumer base. “We started to focus on, ‘Why should people drink raw milk?’ and more importantly, ‘Why should they drink our milk instead of going to the store for it?’” This focus on milk quality and direct marketing for local purchases was the initial driver to look into grazing techniques.

Integrating regenerative agriculture and silvopasture

Even before committing to improved pasture management, Nelson attended a field day on a nearby farm that featured both a workshop and a pasture walk. “I wasn’t even there for the pasture walk,” Nelson admits, “I was really there for the other event. But I caught the walk anyway, and I was ashamed to be seen in that crowd – I felt so dumb. Here was a farmer with a very nice barn that was empty and the cows were out in the meadow.” While the approach was very different from their practices at the time, within two years of research and similar events, Nelson was convinced and beginning to implement better grazing techniques.

“By 2006 we were really investing in learning how to graze,” he shares. “We joined more pasture walks, and in the fall of 2006 we built our first fence, seeded some grass, and the next spring we opened the door and put the cows out for the first time. What a pleasure that was.”

Their farming journey took a break shortly after that, though, when the family was called to mission work. “God was working,” Nelson says, “and in 2009 our family went to Haiti for two years. We turned the farm over to another young couple so that they could get a start in farming.” Nelson and his family returned to the area in 2011 but didn’t return directly to the farm—they lived nearby while the young couple continued to work the farm.

“A number of things came together in 2016,” Nelson recalls. “First, Land O’Lakes said, ‘no more selling raw milk and selling milk to us.’ And the young couple that was taking care of the cows found their own farm! So it worked out nicely; they took the Land O’Lakes connection and the majority of the cows, and we took back over the farm with just enough cows to supply the raw milk business and do the direct marketing for it.”

Now back on the farm with 19 cows and about the same number of heifers, Nelson and the family re-started their raw milk operations with a renewed focus on grazing with a manageably-sized herd to experiment and learn. “While we were gone, the young couple didn’t use our grazing concept,” Nelson shares, “They used a conventional feed plan. But when we came back our goal was to build a grass-fed brand and aim for higher value product.”

The next three years were invested in this infrastructure, he says. “We fenced off more fields, we seeded more grass, and our emphasis became grazing as much as possible throughout the year.”

The process wasn’t perfect, Nelson freely admits. “We definitely had some learning curves! We ran into changes in seasonal milk production—we would run out of milk in the winter for our customers and have to buy in, then in the summer we would have so much extra that we would make cheese.”

They were committed to the concept, though, even as they evaluated the cost-to-benefit comparison of full certification versus balanced approaches. “We were initially planning to go 100% grass-fed,” Nelson shares, “but you really have to earn the right to do that. Back then, as we were switching away from conventional feeds, we didn’t get to 100% grassfed. We started feeding barley alongside, and we still do, just to keep production up. We buy local barley, it’s non-GMO, and a few pounds of grain does go a long way!”

A natural pairing with this grassfed approach was the introduction of silvopasture techniques to preserve this pasture and protect herd health while they grazed. “Even back in our off-farm days, we were interested in permaculture concepts,” Nelson shares, “and silvopasture was becoming a pretty popular topic. We went to our first silvopasture walk in 2012, and that jumpstarted our learning and experimentation in tree-plantings.”

Nelson admits that this early experimentation was pretty rocky. “In those early years we really had no lasting success, but we kept trying,” he shares. One of their early plantings was chestnuts. “We direct-seeded stratified nuts in the soil,” Nelson recalls, “and protected with a tube right above the planted nut. We planted 250 on our own—my son Burnell did a lot of the work. He pounded stakes and wrapped everything in barbed wired—we spent hours and hours and yet only a handful of those actually survived. We had some that froze after stratifying. Mostly the stakes rotted off, or cows would rub on them and break them off.”

Then they received a grant from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation to be part of a three-year study on different types of tree protection methods. “Part of that study was done on our farm,” he says, “And we soon learned that cows respect electric fence more than anything else!”

They took the learnings from these first efforts into the next big one, a planting of 1,000 black locust and chestnut trees through Trees for Grazers, and are much more encouraged by that success rate. “Before we got that professional help and installation, we worked hard planting trees and trying to protect them with stakes and barbed wire,” Nelson shares, “and still we had practically no lasting success. With all that work we still only managed to go from 100% loss to 90% loss. But with the success from that Trees for Grazers planting, we’re much more enthusiastic.” Even now Nelson is working with Trees for Grazers to plan a third and fourth planting on the farm, one planned for this fall and another next spring. “I really like how they help evaluate your situation and your goals to determine tree layout and species selection,” Nelson says. “There are just so many factors to take into account.”

Now that they have a few years of experience, they’re starting to see the first visible benefits of all this work. The planting they did with the Chesapeake Bay Foundation included 120 trees with about a 60% survival rate, and after implementing all-electric tree protection measures in following years, they have seen about a 90% success rate in their 1000-tree plantings. “Most of the loss from those electric-protected plantings was not from cow damage,” Nelson says, but is instead attributed to natural death, rodents, and similar causes. “What is really exciting to see,” he shares, “is that in our sixth year we have practical, useful shade for our cows—one of the outcomes we were looking for! We don’t want to have to bring them in on those bright sunny days, and now they can keep grazing in this shade.”

Other early goals for their tree plantings included the potential for diversified cash crops. “Of that early planting of a 120 trees, a high percentage were fruit trees,” Nelson says. “We wanted to sell fruit in our on-farm store. Of course fruit trees take a while to produce, but we have already gotten some fruit. It’s only enough for the family to eat so far, but we’re thankful for it!” This diversified income stream was also the driver for selecting chestnuts as part of their early plantings as well. “We know it takes up to 15 years to produce a commercial crop rate,” he shares, “but it was exciting that at year 3 we did have a few nuts already! They were just little five-to-six-foot seedlings, but we did get a handful of nuts, and every year we get a bit more.”

These tree plantings are only part of the pasture improvements the Martins have been working on. With a total of 120 acres dedicated almost exclusively to grass pasture, Nelson is also trying to boost that critical annual yield. “We have a few acres of existing woodlot by the creek, but otherwise our acreage is all grass,” Nelson says. “We’ve been dabbling with inter-seeding winter and summer annuals into our perennial pastures. We definitely aren’t seeing 100% success, but it does seem like it has helped.”

Re-centering dairy operations—and milk quality

In addition to all of this investment in long-term pasture infrastructure, the Martins have also continued to slowly and intentionally grow their herd from 40 in 2016 to about 140 now, with plans to continue expanding their milking herd to meet demand. “We’re milking about 35 right now,” Nelson shares, “and we’ve been keeping and raising all our heifers for the past couple of years with the goal of doubling our milking herd in the next two years.”

That includes upgrading their milking operations to meet both this current and planned future herd size. The Martins have an older tie-stall barn and milking system that needed to be replaced, so they renovated an addition to that original barn to become the new parlor. “We bought and installed a used single-eight milking parlor,” he says, “and laid everything out so that we can expand to a double-eight when the herd gets bigger.”

Similar to the decision to prioritize grass feeding while maintaining a small amount of grain supplements, Country Sunrise Creamery is not fully organic. Nelson believes in the principles of organic farming, but choosing whether to pursue the full certification comes down to balancing those values with the very practical cost-to-benefit comparison for their specific operations. The Martins have worked hard over the years to build up a local brand based on proven quality, and so they don’t see that the full certification process would add significant value to their product for their customers. “I tell people we think in organic terms,” Nelson shares. “We don’t use herbicides or insecticides, we want to understand why any issues exist and treat their root causes to prevent them from reoccurring.”

The certification process is a lot of work and not an insignificant expense, and the Martins decided that, in their situation, that wouldn’t be offset by predictable increases in financial gain. “Because we’re direct marketing, our people already know us,” he explains. “We have so much more transparency and visibility than someone shipping to a co-op. So for us, it’s just not worth the expense and paperwork to certify.” The decision also allows them more flexibility, he explains. “If I have a neighbor who has some extra hay and we’re short, we’re able to buy it—it doesn’t impact our certification or status. The same goes for cows—we’re not limited to buying from organic herds. We’ll buy a cow and milk her if she’s a good cow.”

This adaptive approach is obvious in the Martins’ evolving herd genetics. “We started in 2016 with all Holsteins,” Nelson shares, “and we still have a few pure Holsteins—but we got into crossbreeding right away and as we found opportunities we brought Jerseys, Guernseys, and other breeds into the herd. At first we did AI cross-breeding, but then in 2018 we bought a bull—a Pinzgauer.” Here he pauses, “Have you ever heard of those?” and then he laughs, “It’s not a popular breed.”

Pinzgauers are a dual-purpose breed from Austria, he explains. “We were looking for health traits—durability, survivability, calving ease, and strong feet.” Crossed with the Holstein herd, Nelson is pleased with the quality and quantity of the steers and calves that they’ve raised to supply beef to the farm store and fill orders for quarters and halves directly to consumers.

“We still have some Pinzgauer genetics in the herd,” he shares, but likely less than a quarter per cow with the since-added Jersey and Guernsey genes. “We were glad for the genetic influence,” he says, “but we did notice that when we selected more for beef, it seems like they were a little wilder... less happy to be milked. We sold a few cows over their temperament, and as the genetics diluted, we now have some nice descendants that are tame enough.” The Pinzgauer crosses were great mothers, Nelson shares, but weren’t willing to adopt any other calves—and their milk production didn’t compare to Holsteins. “The Pins took care of themselves,” as Nelson says, “they would sacrifice milk production to maintain body condition.” After the Pinzgauer bull they had a Jersey and then a Lineback, but have recently shifted back to Holstein genetics with a new, shorter Holstein bull, and they’re excited to bring that milk production back into the genetic pool. Nelson shares, “We’ve also learned that you can select for good health traits within a breed without needing to crossbreed.”

Improving milk production remains a long-term goal for the farm. “As our herd wasn’t very big, eventually we stopped using DHIA, so we don’t have official records of annual production,” Nelson shares. “But our daily average is in the low 30s (pounds-per-cow), and as we improve forage production and bring back Holstein genetics, we think we’re going to get closer to 40 (pounds) per cow—without increasing the grain supplement.”

The Martins have tested and evolved their milking schedule to fit their needs, as well. For a number of years, instead of once-a-day or twice-a-day milking, the Martins milked every 14 to 17 hours. “We’d milk at noon one day, then early morning the next day, then late evening the next day, and back to noon again,” Nelson recalls. “In a given week we’d milk 11 times instead of 14. That has its benefits, but with the young boys coming on and more need for regular routine, we’re trying to milk twice a day with an emphasis on consistency.”

“There’s pros and cons to either schedule,” Nelson shares. “There were times we were glad to take a noon milking and then have the evening free! But in three years a family can change a lot, and that changes your labor pool. Now that we have more adults and fewer youngsters, the routine is good and if someone needs an evening off, we can shift and be flexible and still maintain that schedule.”

The Martins’ “mostly organic” approach is evident in their commitment to natural and non-chemical herd health solutions. “We try to control the conditions to manage animal health,” Nelson says, rather than relying on chemicals to treat the problems that emerge from bad conditions.

“One thing that we are glad for is to feed Fertrell Fly Aside,” Nelson shares, a dry mineral with sulfur powder, garlic salt, and bentonite clay. “We also use Redmond Udder Mud for swollen udders and mastitis—it uses Redmond clay and peppermint oil—as well as Van Beek IntegriVIX pellets for lameness and infection in cattle.”

These remedies reduce but of course don’t remove the need for veterinarian support. “As part of the raw milk permit we vet-test for TB and Brucellosis,” Nelson shares. “Also for information purposes, we tested for Johnes Disease—paratuberculosis. We’ve had it in the herd in the past, but we have none now and we feel that comes mostly from our calving being outside and less exposed to bacterial transfer in bedding.”

Farm labor, management and generational evolution

Family values are at the heart of the Martins’ operation, and family labor is a critical component of their success and their ongoing growth and evolution. “I have nine children,” Nelson shares, “and eight of them are still at home, involved in some way or another with running the farm. The older ones have outside hobbies and interests, of course. My two adult daughters are into photography—so if I send any pictures in without their permission, I’m in trouble!” he laughs.

This family-focused labor pool means constant change and growth. “Each year they get older, and that changes the dynamics of who is doing what chores—their responsibilities shift as they grow older, and that keeps you on your toes,” Nelson shares. “With the new milking parlor, the boys are able to help more, even the younger boys, and that allows me to do more administration and farm management,” he adds. “My parents are also still involved on a daily basis, and it’s increasingly obvious that it’s not my wit and wisdom keeping us in business!”

The most recent evolution feels like a big shift from this small, family-farm feel and regenerative, mostly-organic approach—but it’s part of evolving as a family and farm: the Martins just built a commercial-scale chicken house on the farm.

Nelson is frank about his initial misgivings about the project, but is completely invested and supportive. “This was a bunch of humble pie for me to eat,” he says, “I didn’t identify with any of the mindset that goes into commercial chicken farming. But the path was clear, I was gently led into it, and today we’re making it work so that we don’t have to compromise any aspect of our grassfed farming… but now we also have a commercial-scale conventional poultry operation.”

This new enterprise is driven by the next generation, but it’s all part of the same farm. “Our family runs it,” Nelson shares, “The daily responsibilities really belong to a couple of the kids, but we work together, and financially it’s all part of the same operation.” Financially speaking, it’s an even bigger shift for the family. “For us, this is a huge operation; we budgeted millions of dollars,” Nelson says. “It went against what I stood for—we had been operating on a practically no-debt mentality.” But to undertake a project this ambitious, an equally ambitious investment is needed—and that meant a completely different financial climate.

Fortunately, it is all working out so far. “We had it all budgeted, and then with a lot of mercy from God we came in quite a bit under budget,” Nelson shares. “So we’re now able to use some of those already-approved funds to support investments in the dairy operation.” Renovating and expanding the milking parlor was phase one of this investment, and now Nelson plans to make improvements to their feed bunk and housing structure. “Our feed bunk is 40 years old,” Nelson shares, “and we can’t drive a skidloader into it, so we have to load from the side and overall we end up with a lot of waste. This new one we’re planning will have accommodations to drive in the end, it will include headlocks, plus a higher roof so we can bring bales in better from the side.”

The new chicken operation brings its own benefits to these existing operations as well—namely high-quality manure. The Martins have always composted, from bedding and manure from the dairy to autumn leaf collection piles from the local town, but this scale of poultry manure brings new options. “It’s possible that the boys could take on a commercial composting operation to utilize this new resource,” he says, further diversifying the farm’s cash flow while also improving pasture and tree planting productivity.

All of this was made possible by the commitment to evolving the operations into the next generation’s vision of the farm, and Nelson thanks God for both the guidance and the success: “I certainly couldn’t have planned it this way.”

Looking to the future, with gratitude for past support

Nelson expresses his gratitude in speaking to every farm subject. To have grown and evolved and learned so much over the years, to have received such unexpected blessings, and to continue to have access to great support—all of these have contributed to where the farm is now.

“We got help from Kitchen Table Consultants, now called Good Roots, to help clean up our finances and make our books more reliable,” Nelson shares. “That was a big help, and it would be nice if there were more consultants like them. Most consultants are more geared toward commercial operations. Now that we’ve stabilized our recordkeeping and finances, we’ve just started having them coach us on marketing—they really understand the direct marketing side.”

He’s also grateful for all the in-person workshops and pasture walks that introduced him to new ideas and guided him along his grazing, permaculture, and silvopasture learning journey. “I always enjoy those events,” he shares. “In fact, we hosted one back in May where we had decision-makers from government offices out and we got to showcase the value of silvopasture and educate these representatives so that when it comes up in their discussions they understand it and think favorably toward it. We need more of those.”

Nelson has a heartfelt spiritual answer to the question, ‘what help do farmers need?’

“Many farmers are religious, and that’s a good thing,” he says. “They recognize that they have a need that is bigger than themselves. However, a religion about God without God and his power, can only go so far. If any farmer, that is, any human being who wants to please God, would learn to pray in a healthy way they can expect an answer from the living God. This is called, doing business with God. It is not for everyone—only for those who have a healthy fear of God and want to grow in that.”

All in all, the future of farming looks bright—not least because he’s watching it bloom among his own children and their new vision blended in with the family tradition.

“We’ve had a number of factors that have helped us out,” he says. “We are thankful for all those factors—some days maybe it even feels like an unfair advantage, but when you get those you just have to be humble enough to accept them.”

Look forward to meeting the Martin family and experiencing their custom blend of grazing and silvopasture at the next NODPA pasture walk!

Posted: to Featured Farms on Sat, Jul 4, 2026
Updated: Sat, Jul 4, 2026