Calder Dairy & Farm

«TURN AROUND IF YOUR PET IS IN YOUR CAR» — So I turned around! :(
Seems like you could have parked in an outer lot and left dog in car, just to buy some fresh dairy…

A donkey had bit my daughter, and when i tried to address it with the owners, no one wanted to speak with me, and even after almost a year with no contact. Thank God she did not contract any illness from the dairy. I had the sheriff and animal control go out there and quarantine these animals. Obviously they thought it was a joke, while putting up a «do not feed the donkeys, they bite» sign. My daughter was only 3 years old. We love to support local businesses, but they dismissed me and my worries and gave us a hard time as well as the sheriff. They are not taken care of there and I cannot believe they didn’t even offer a peace of mind. Shame on you all.

The best place, ever! If you love animals you have got to come here!
Inside the store you can buy feed for the ducks/​geese, goats, bunnies and donkeys. you can feed this to any animal except for the cows, they eat hay.
The goats here are hysterical, they are like little clowns desperate for some extra food. Not because they’re hungry, just because they are greedy little bastards (in the friendliest possible way).
The donkeys are the cutest creatures on this planet, but beware of the miniature horses; they are nippy. do not touch! Geese roam around freely, so do several massive pigs. Though when we visited we found them passed out in a stack of hay, snoozing and snoring.
If you stand in front of the cows, there is a white building to the left. Enter through that door and a ton of newborn calphs await you. Best surprise ever! Also inside are some (smaller variety) pigs.
Before you leave stop back by the store. They have sinks for handwashing (yay) and ice cream (double yay). Also: they sell their cocolate milk, which I think is the best around.

What a wonderful experience… We had an amazing time and will definItely be returning!

This is a great way to learn a little bit about how a farm works and enjoy some fantastic ice cream! I recommend the pumpkin ice cream in the fall =).
The employees are friendly and knowledgeable.
The animals are treated well and seem to enjoy the attention.
I definitely recommend this for families looking for an outing that won’t break the bank!

Uhggg what can I say about this place? Owners are super nice and love to answer all your question and all the animals look happy to be there. The whole milk (in the glass bottle of course) is to die for and the.chocolate.milk is delicious. I’ll deffinitel be back to try some of their eggs, butter, and well… more milk! And to play with cows of course.

My cousin lives about a mile away from here and tipped me off about the place while I was there visiting. I thought it sounded like a fun place to take the kids so we stopped in on the way home. I’m glad we did.
It’s a big enough farm that you get the sense of being on a real deal working farm.
But it’s small enough that it has the intimacy of a petting farm.
A great place to take the kids. Plus once you’re done touring the farm and petting the critters there is ice cream to be had. Who doesn’t like freshly churned ice cream?
While we were there we saw cows, horses, ponies, goats, pigs, bunnies, chickens, roosters, ducks, geese, peacocks, and pheasants. There were lots of baby cows and a baby pig that was cute as a button. For every couple animals behind bars there was one wandering freely (including a cow and some pigs). They also encourage you to help feed the animals, which is a lot of fun. You get a sense of closeness and live interaction with the animals here unlike any other «open to the public» farm I have ever been to.
We will definitely be stopping back in next time we are out in the area. It’s a little bit out of the way, from anywhere really, but it’s worth the trip. Did I mention there is no admission charge? Sweet.

I’m a bit of a dairy snob so I could t go all the way to 5. They do make quality ice cream without all the garbage ingredients that you find at the grocery.
They have a lot of educational information here. Kids will learn a lot if they’ve never had farm exposure.
Good local company

Stopped here on our way back from Toledo and it was a little hard to find; don’t trust your cell phone map if you have Sprint. It is way off the beaten path, but worth the visit. When you pull up to the farm though, there is a big sign that tells you to turn around and go home if you have your dog in the car with you. I can appreciate that if it’s summer time and you shouldn’t be leaving your dog in a hot box or taking it out for a walk around the barn, scaring all the farm animals, but it was 40 degrees out when we went and we weren’t about to turn around because of some stupid sign (our dog is small and quiet anyway). If you go in early spring you will want to bring either Wellies or a pair of sandwich bags with rubber bands because you will be walking through a lot of mud and poop. The dairy store is pretty small, but they have quite the ice cream selection and there is plenty of indoor seating. They also carry strawberry banana yogurt in the cooler (not frozen, unfortunately). Lots of animals to look at, too: potbelly pigs, sheep, cows, chickens, Shetland ponies, mountain goats, bunnies, peacocks, ducks, and a duck/​rooster hybrid (?).

I found Calder Brothers Dairy through their store at first. I was working in Lincoln Park one day and wanted an ice cream cone for the ride home. I stumbled upon a gem that day. I kept stopping in every time I ended up in Lincoln Park and after standing in the doorway and watching them make ice cream and learning that the milk comes from their own farm I branched out into milk, butter, sour cream…
You just can’t get natural milk from anyone else these days and that’s shame because it’s what milk is supposed to be. Cream on the top and full fat milk can’t be beat. Plus their cows graze on Michigan pasture, they are a family business and now they deliver to a bunch of retail outlets. I should mention that they also offer low fat milk, which honestly is what I buy most of the time. And all of the milk comes in glass bottles. Glass makes milk taste better. Period
I generally get my Calder products at Westborn market these days.

So sometimes there’s cows giving birth and stuff, which is great because the number one thing I want to look at while eating my ice cream is placenta. If you’re not into that though, I would say order your amazingly fresh ice cream and instead sit on the picnic tables and watch a donkey try to climb onto a table or go watch the workers milk the cows or look at the puppies and kittens.
If you love animals and/​or ice cream and/​or life, you should go here because it’s the best.

My husband and I were trying to figure out a fun, inexpensive and outside Ann Arbor activity for an extremely HOT Sunday afternoon, when we thought, what the heck, why not check out where the milk we buy comes from.
The Calder Dairy Farm (not where they pasteurize/​process the milk and other dairy products) is about a 45 minute drive from Ann Arbor in Carleton, MI. It is quite a trek through farmland and winding country roads, but well worth the trip.
As we drove up the long, dirt driveway to the farm, we were greeted by chickens, goats, roosters and other farm animals just walking around like they owned the place. The animals were friendly though, and were happy to let you give them a pat on the head.
We walked into the store to get some ice cream, after all that was the purpose of this trip. The store sells quite a variety of ice cream flavors that you can buy by the dish/​cone, or even purchase by the pint for consumption at home. In addition to ice cream, you can buy milk, butter, cream and other dairy products. The majority of the products are Calder Dairy, but there are a few random cheeses and butter from other companies. The ice cream is all Calder though.
After trying a couple flavors, I settled on the Peanut Butter and my husband chose the Chocolate Chocolate Chip. The ice cream was some of the best ice cream I have ever eaten; it is extremely rich, thick, creamy and delicious. Three things that I really liked about the ice cream were: (1) the ice cream was smooth, not icy, like you sometimes get; (2) the peanut butter was mixed in; in other words, it wasn’t just vanilla ice cream with chunks of peanut butter; and (3) the ice cream seemed to get even better as it melted, which happened quite quickly in the 95 degree heat. I don’t know how to say this, but it melted in a way that it was still thick and creamy, not thin and watery.
Not only was the ice cream a-​one, but the portions were HUGE. We got a single scoop and I felt like it was too much for me. I would probably get a kiddie cup or share next time. The only negative I will say is the staff were hesitant about letting you try the different flavors and were not super talkative or knowledgeable about the company. They were fine though. The staff did know more about the animals when asked.
Probably the most fun part of this trip was as we ate our ice cream, we could walk around and look at/​pet the animals (probably not the most sanitary, but whatever). They also have baby cows and goats, which are the cutest things ever! I will definitely come back here in the future, even though it is a little out of my way.

This is an amazing place to bring the kids. It was educational for my «city» kids to see the baby cows being fed and the animals in the farmyard. The dairy cats running about fat from fresh milk were a particular draw to my daughter. My son, on the other hand, had a ball chasing the geese and ducks on the edge of the little pond.
The ice cream is amazing. Looking closely at the ingredient labels underneath the flavor titles, there are no «unnatural» ingredients for most choices (ok, when you delve into the obviously unnatural like bubble gum flavored ice cream, there isn’t any natural way to concoct that). I had the peach ice cream this weekend and it was amazing with chunks of real peaches made with cream and plain sugar. The portion size is huge and the pricing reasonable.
We also purchased butter, sour cream, milk, and buttermilk to take home with us. We made biscuits with the buttermilk and they were divine. The richness of fresh buttermilk is something lost between the dairy, the packaging plant, and the supermarket.
Overall, this is an amazing place to visit.

Here is where all the milk for the delicious Calder Dairy products comes from, and it is a destination in itself. This is a working dairy farm that is open to the public 7 days a week. An the farm, there are the obligatory cows being raised and milked, and also a wide variety of other petting farm animals like goats, chickens, roosters, pheasants, geese, ponies, and peacocks roaming the grounds This is a great place to bring the kids for an authentic, uncrowded, farm experience.
The real Unilocal info is this: The Ice Cream is the best in the area, and their other legendary products like the butter, cream, and dips are all for sale. My favorites plavors are Butter Pecan and White House Cherry.
This is great Sunday drive destination for the family, or a quick stop for a break when out back-​road motorcycling with the buddies, Stony Creek Rd is one of the better roads in the area.