Every stage of an animal’s life matters in order for her to reach her full potential as a cow. Newborn calves rely on the farmer to assist them in building their immune system. As a calf’s caretaker, it is important to take a course in “Feeding Colostrum 101” to avoid having to “dial 911” on your calf’s health.

It all started because Jo wanted a small lawn behind the house. Tom encouraged her. Tom’s friend offered to lend them his heavy-duty, magnum, Humvee version of a tiller. Jo borrowed my Ram diesel to pick it up in Sierra Vista, 30 miles away. I received the call at sundown. She was broke down. “It won’t start.”

The news out of Iraq is not good. There is much discussion today about the history of our U.S. government involvement in the Middle Eastern country.The discussion includes the military costs of lives and material, the civilian costs of lives and planning effort and the infrastructure costs, and finally the hundreds of thousands of hours spent working with the host national government in Baghdad and the provinces.

The Wisconsin 4th District Court of Appeals ruled against a pair of raw milk producers, denying their petition for court orders declaring that their raw milk sales were legal. The appeals court ruling published Aug. 7 did not address whether or not raw milk sales were legal, but did agree with a lower court ruling that the milk producers needed a milk producer license to distribute milk produced on their farms, according to the decision.

According to Gregory Karp of the Chicago Tribune, John Deere will be laying off 600 of its employees in the next few months. The four factories affected are in Moline and East Moline, Illinois; Ankeny, Iowa; and Coffeyville, Kansas. John Deere is based out of Moline.

Cows raised on organic and conventional dairy farms in three regions of the U.S. show no significant differences in health or in the nutritional content of their milk, according to a new study by Oregon State University researchers and their collaborators.

Graduate of Western Technical College Summer intern at Wisconsin Holstein AssociationBaraboo, Wisconsin

Samantha Kaminski Dairy Data Program Specialist Genex Cooperative Inc. Shawano, Wisconsin

Approximately 100 attendees from Kentucky and Indiana attended the eighth annual Kentuckiana Dairy Exchange in central Kentucky, July 29-30.They visited five central Kentucky farms selected for top-notch management, high production, low somatic cell counts and great on-farm innovation.

There are several types of emergencies that can occur on a dairy farm. Some result from the forces of nature, some involve fire and explosion, and others may involve system failures. Some emergencies involve traffic or transportation problems, and some result from the behavior of people and animals.