350-Acre Dakin Dairy Farms For Sale In East Manatee County

MYAKKA CITY, FL — Dakin Dairy, one of Manatee County’s last dairy farms, is on the market for an undisclosed amount.

The “turn-key” 350-acre Myakka City farm has about 3,000 “lactating cows” with the capacity to expand the herd size to 4,000, according to the property’s listing from SVN | Saunders Ralston Dantzler Real Estate.

It also has six free-stall barns, a milking parlor, production areas, commodity storage, silage storage, and a milk processing plant for processing and packing milk produced on site.

After 22 years in business, owner Jerry Dakin, a former Florida Farm Bureau Farmer of the Year, said he hopes the property will remain a working farm.

"This is my baby. I mean, I've grown it. And I want to see the next person be more successful than me," he told WTSP.

The 55-year-old decided to sell the farm following the deaths of his two brothers in recent years, which got him thinking about his legacy and the future of farming in Manatee County.

"I'm doing everything to make sure this (farm) is going to be here in 50 years when I'm passed and gone, that's my biggest thing," Dakin told the Observer Media Group. "What can I do so that the community will have farming in the county?"

Preserving the property as a working dairy farm is “non-negotiable,” he told ABC7.

Once the property is sold, Dakin will remain in Myakka City and plans to spend his time supporting local agriculture, reports said.