The numbers are incorrect. Patty Edelburg is not a good source for accurate numbers although it could be possible a zero was added to 700 as that's considerably closer to the actual number of closures in 2018.
The USDA recorded 2,731 farms closed in the entire country 2018, almost a 7% drop by my calculations.
Look through NASS for WI:
https://quickstats.nass.usda.gov/Wisconsin Agricultural Statistics Service (WASS):
Number of Licensed Dairy Herds: 7,619 herds (August 1, 2019)
Number of Dairy Cows: 1,268,000 dairy cows (July 2019)
Average Number of Cows Per Dairy Farm: 166 dairy cows (July 2019)
This can be verified with the 2019 quarterly export information, its printable and accessible at the bottom of this page:
https://datcp.wi.gov/Pages/Growing_WI/ExportStatistics.aspxWI Dairy press release:
https://www.nass.usda.gov/Statistics_by_State/Wisconsin/Publications/Dairy/in...