Barn Hero Summer Doty: Prioritizing Pig Care
Barn Hero w/ Supers UPDATE
Summer Doty hasn’t saved anyone from a burning building or led an army into battle. She hasn’t jumped into the path of an oncoming train or dismantled a bomb. Still, the work she does day in and day out at Islercrest Farms is proof that not all heroes wear capes.
Experts offer different definitions of heroism, but most agree it involves putting others first without the expectation of reward. That’s why Nathan Isler, co-owner of Islercrest Farms in Prospect, Ohio, believes Doty defines what it means to be a barn hero.
“Our No. 1 goal on our farm is always to take the best care possible of our animals. A person who excels at doing this, who can identify and put an animal’s needs above all else, is a barn hero,” Isler says.
It wasn’t a hard decision to hire Doty after she completed her animal science degree at Wilmington College in 2021. After searching the job board at school, she applied for a farrowing manager position at Islercrest.
Growing up on a family farm near Mingo, Ohio, Doty has been around animals her entire life. She began raising her own showpigs in seventh grade. Although, they never had more than six sows on the farm at a time, she says that number suited her family just fine. It allowed them to raise their own pigs to show while gaining valuable experience managing a small herd.
“When you come across a kid with a farm background, you get excited,” Isler says. “We are biased that farm kids come in with a strong work ethic.”
Summer Doty's passion for pigs is evident in how she approaches every task on the farm, says farm co-owner Nathan Isler.
He says although Doty might not seem to be different than many people who got their start in 4-H and FFA and moved on to other careers, she continues to stand out.
“What makes her special is that she didn’t let go of that interest and passion,” Isler says. “She clung to it and turned it into a career that she is excelling at. It’s pretty unique to find something you truly care about and do it for a living.”
Some Things You Just Can’t Teach
When Isler met Doty, he says it was easy to see she loved animals. In fact, he often teases her that she doesn’t get paid to hold baby pigs and talk to the sows. But one can easily see it’s her connection with the animals that makes her so special on the farm.
“I don’t care if you have experience; I can teach you,” Isler says. “What I want to know first and foremost is that you love animals. I can teach anyone to care for hogs, that’s been my whole life, but truly caring about animals is something you can’t teach.”
Doty is quick to point out the learning curve was steep. She came in thinking she knew what to expect, but learned the sheer quantity of animals she’d be caring for each day was much different than what she had grown up experiencing on the family farm.
“I knew how hogs functioned and behaved on a very small scale, but when you move to a farrowing house with hundreds of sows to take care of all the time — that was quite different,” Doty says. “I knew the basic procedures, but I needed to learn how to manage the scale of everything — to keep it all straight in my head and create a plan and goal for the end of the day every single day.”
On her first day, she started in the gestation barn where Isler taught her how to check heat and breed sows.
“Technically, I had bred sows before, but how they did it was completely new to me. I had never checked heat on a large scale. I had never used a boar bot to bring the boar around in front of them. I also had never bred with intra-uterine rods,” she says.
Although Summer Doty spends the majority of her time in farrowing, she knows her way around all the jobs on the sow farm.
She spent the rest of her first week trailing behind Isler, learning how their operation approaches the daily tasks of pork production.
“Learning how to pace myself every day and create a schedule was probably one of the hardest things to learn at first,” Doty adds.
As farrowing barn manager, her responsibilities include caring for the farrowing house, making sure the sows are settled in and farrowing correctly, and most importantly, attending to the day-zero and day-one litters. She also helps the gestation team as needed. In addition, daily maintenance, cleaning and observing animal health are key parts of her job every day.
The list of jobs is long, Doty admits. That might be what surprised her most about working on a pork operation.
“It’s amazing how many things I do in a day — to keep the barn running, to complete the day’s tasks and to set myself up for next day,” Doty explains. “Most people don’t realize how many things there are to do to make the barn run effectively.”
Leading By Example
Of all the work Doty does in the barn, farrowing is what she loves most.
“The pigs are the highlight of my day, every day,” she says. “If you are ever having a bad day, pick up a newborn pig and walk around with it for a while. They always make your day better, whether they know they’re doing it or not.”
As an animal lover himself, Isler says it’s easy to see how much Doty enjoys what she does in the barn. He says her passion for pigs is one of the qualities that separates her from other employees who have good work ethic but don’t have the drive and passion for animals like she does.
In addition to her passion for animals, Doty is a lead-by-example person, Isler says.
“She is one that will take charge and make things happen. Others around her see that, including myself. A lot of times that is one of the better ways to lead. It’s a ‘see what I’m doing and try to keep up’ mentality,” he explains.
On most days, the sow barn is run by Isler, Doty and Hector Zumaya. At times, other employees will come in to help for a day or part of a day when needed. Doty says she feels privileged to work alongside one of the owners.
“It’s nice to know the owner has been in your shoes and wants to know every facet of what’s going on at the farm. It’s such a comfort having an owner who does the job and knows how to do it nearby,” Doty says. “I know I can call him for anything. Also, I learn every day.”
Quiet Wisdom
There’s no denying working in a barn is stressful. Some days, things don’t go right. Animals get sick. Equipment breaks. Mistakes get made. Doty has learned it’s not good to carry stress from day to day.
No matter the industry, compassion fatigue is a real challenge among caretakers. Doty says animal care is much better when employees can take a break from the struggles of the barn.
“When I first started this job, we were going through a bad disease break,” she adds. “You do get fatigued feeling like you can’t do anything and also like you aren’t doing enough. It’s hard to balance that — going home at the end of day and feeling like you haven’t done enough.”
That’s why she has learned going home and forgetting about the barn is key. It allows her to start over the next day with a clean slate and a clean mind.
It’s this kind of quiet wisdom coming from 25-year-old Doty that continually impresses Isler. Although she might be a more reserved personality, she’s also not afraid to share her opinion when it’s needed.
“Summer likes to do her thing and go. She has no issues working or talking with other co-workers. She is extremely easy to get along with,” Isler says. “I’ve never had anyone say anything negative about her personality, which is rare when it comes to any work environment.”
Hector Zumaya says he likes working alongside Summer Doty because she sets a great example for others to follow. Photo by Nathan Isler.
Zumaya says she is easy to work with in the barn.
“Summer is always very helpful to me when I need guidance,” he adds. “She always works hard and cares so much about the pigs.”
Doty also has great initiative. She knows what needs to be done and makes it happen. Because of this, Isler says he continues to hand her more and more responsibility on the farm.
“Just like any good employee, her role has evolved,” he says. “She has taken over a lot of the data entry. She also helps train new employees as well. We transitioned over to a new data system after she arrived. She may protest, but I think she secretly likes being in charge of our data. She likes having the records easy to access and she believes in why we do it.”
Doty says it’s important to know a sow’s history when she comes into the farrowing barn. Being able to provide sows extra care if they’ve had problems in the past, knowing past treatments or if they’ve chronically had a problem, are just a few of many things she looks at that are relevant to her performing her job to the best of her best ability.
“It would be hard to make informed decisions without the data,” she adds.
What’s Next?
People might not realize how rewarding working in a barn with animals can be, Doty says. She has enjoyed jobs in the past, but she never felt like they had payoff at the end of the day. At Islercrest Farms, she says it’s a constant reassurance that she’s done something that matters for the day.
“The work you put in, you see in a day or two. You see how it benefits litters days later, and then at 20 days when you send them to the nursery. It’s very gratifying seeing them grow up, and then to see what you’ve raised and sent out of the barn,” she says.
Isler hopes Doty never forgets how much she is appreciated. He also hopes people outside of commercial pork production who have an interest in pigs and livestock will consider this rewarding career path.
L to R: Nathan Isler, Summer Doty and David Isler. The opportunity to learn the business directly from an owner every day is one of Summer Doty's favorite things about her job.
“There are a lot of kids out there who like showing pigs like Summer did, but maybe they aren’t certain of what opportunities are out there. They may also have an incorrect view of production agriculture,” he says. “I hope Summer’s story opens people’s eyes to the very real impact you could make in agriculture in this career.”
While, Doty wouldn’t call herself a barn hero, those who work with her and see her in action know otherwise.
“I’m not sure if I’m terribly unique,” she adds, “other than it’s something I enjoy and want to do every day.”
However, if you want to give her a cape, she’s not afraid to wear it.
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