Marburger Farm Dairy in Evans City is being forced to dump milk because other industries shut down from the coronavirus pandemic have stopped buying milk.

The fields at Marburger Farm Dairy in Evans City are running white.

Milk, gallons and gallons of it, has had to be dumped.

Commercial demand tanked because of the coronavirus pandemic and the dairy farm exhausted outlets to unload its surplus of 90,000 gallons per week.

“We are starting to dump milk — we started (Tuesday),” said Craig Marburger, vice president of Marburger Farm Dairy. “It's a hard thing to do. We're doing everything we can to use every ounce of milk.”

Many dairy farms in Pennsylvania and around the country have been forced to drench their land with milk as well.

COVID-19 has choked the market.

Schools are closed. So are restaurants and other institutional users of milk, both in liquid form and for other products, namely cheese.

Leroy and Mary Bergbigler of Bergbigler Dairy in Clearfield Township said they haven't yet had to dump product.

But it's still coming.

Cows still need to be milked, after all.

The American Dairy Association North East (ADA North East) is working with retailers in its six-state region to lift limitations on how much milk and dairy products consumers can purchase.

Initially, consumers attempted to stock up on essential items, including milk, and many stores posted limits on the amount of dairy and other necessities that could be purchased. Recently, shoppers have stopped those bulk purchases.

This is an excerpt from a larger article that will appeared in Sunday's Butler Eagle. Subscribe online or in print to read how other dairies in the county are being affected by the coronavirus.