U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar recently garnered help for Minnesota Dairy Farmers from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

But as Tiffany Tarrolly found out at a dairy farm in Carlton County, that help may actually become a hindrance.

While the cows at the Green Pastures Dairy farm are being herded in the direction of fresh grass, a federal program aimed at helping milk more money into the industry has some worried it may end up spoiling things in the end.

The U.S.D.A. plans to purchase dairy products from the industry and provide them to food shelf programs throughout country.

At Green Pastures Dairy in Carlton County, these cows are the Hedquists livelihood.

But their milk is not pasteurized and bottled; instead it's sold as cheese.

"We decided to specialize and then pursue our own markets and meet the needs of our own customer base," said the father of six, Will Hedquist.

Klobuchar's new help wouldn't impact Will Hedquists family- but it would have years ago when they tried commodity dairy farming.

"It was not generating the income that we needed from the farm, as our family grew we needed additional income and it just could not provide that," said Hedquist.

The Hedquists learned early on that commodity dairy farming is not cost effective.

"When we take and put all of our time and effort and cost into producing a product and then just simply hand it off to someone else to market, we really put ourselves in a vulnerable and weak position," said Hedquist.

He says that's the inherent problem with Klobuchar's new program.

"I don't think that it will really have that much of an impact," he said.

The program is designed to help balance the rising supply, with falling prices.

Demand for milk is down and the cost of corn, a staple in a most cows' diets, is up.

"For the most part, government programs tend to hurt diary farmers more than they help them, just in that it tends to create a lot of dependency not only on those programs but also on just the current pricing structure of commodity milk that the USDA has set up," Hedquist said.

He says Klobuchar should instead pursue a more difficult path, but one that would benefit dairy farmers across the country.

"The answer to low milk prices today really is just the privatization of our national food supply and by that, I mean farmers taking their products directly to the consumer and setting their own prices based on their inputs," said Hedquist.

He says this lack of private control is a major factor that's led to the drastic reduction of Dairy Farms in Carlton County.

"There used to be more dairy farms in Carlton County than any other county in the state of Minnesota back in the early 1900s and today, there's just a handful," said Hedquist.

The Hedquists are happy they took a different route years ago... but as exampled by Carlton County, it might be too late for other dairy farms to change their course.

The Hedquists have a cheese shop on their farm.

They sell all kinds of Gouda, and are open Friday and Saturday 10 to 4.

You can also find them at the farmer's market in Duluth Wednesdays and Saturday from 7AM to 12PM at 3rd Street and 14th Avenue East.

They also sell turkey, pork, eggs and more.

Find out more about the Hedquist's at their website, Green Pastures Dairy!