As the number of cows in the state again has begun to rise, so has the number of women playing significant roles in agriculture.

"The farming operation is becoming so mechanized that the physical aspect is becoming a lot easier for women to manage," said Mary Kay Van Der Geest, who runs one of Wisconsin's largest milking operations near Merrill.

Women have begun to make strides in the traditionally male-dominated U.S. farming culture, said Michael Bell, a rural sociology professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

The National Agricultural Statistics Service's most recent agricultural census, done in 2002, showed women were the principal operators of 7,353 Wisconsin farms, up about 27 percent from 1997, compared with about a 13 percent increase nationally during that period. The percentage of Wisconsin's principal farm operators who are women increased from 6.7 percent in 1997 to 9.5 percent in 2002. A new count is under way.

Bell said the high cost of mechanized equipment can be a barrier to buying a farm. But he said women tend to live longer than men and many -- such as Van Der Geest -- often take over farms after their husbands die, either heading the operation or renting the land to others.

Van Der Geest got into farming after she married a livestock dealer who decided to start a dairy farm near Merrill with 17 cows in 1969. It has grown to 3,000 cows, and she has headed it since he died in 2000.

Although she fed and milked the cows during the early years of the operation, she now handles administrative chores. She employs several women who do more traditional farm work.

More younger women are entering the profession than 30 years ago.

According to the University of Wisconsin-Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, there were 1,311 women enrolled last fall and 1,005 men, compared with 796 men and just 353 women during the 1977-1978 school year.

Diane Grezenski and her husband of 21 years operate a dairy farm outside of Stevens Point, and she has taken on more and more of the farm work over the years.

Her husband does the field work and pitches in on milking when he can, while working full-time at a nearby paper mill.

"Somebody has to work elsewhere to get health insurance, and often it is the man because they usually can find better paying jobs," she said.