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There seems to be a fair amount of confusion in our industry over the status of charcoal powder as a feed ingredient. In 2012, the Association of American Feed Control Officials gave a ruling effectively banning the addition and manufacture of plant-based activated charcoal for feeding purposes.
“They are making an easy 80 pounds of milk. Body condition score is good. The herd’s reproduction and culling are going extremely well, but I just can’t get over how much smaller their Holsteins are than most herds.” This was a recent conversation I shared with another consultant while evaluating a dairy in central California.
This article was #7 of the Top 25 most well-read articles on www.progressivedairy.com in 2013.
Click here for the full list of the Top 25.
Activity monitors continue to draw interest within the dairy industry. Producers are familiar with pedometers for activity and collars for activity and rumination; in this New Technology feature, we introduced you to an ear tag sensor that measures activity, rumination and temperature.
Evolution X2 liner Following the introduction of the Evolution X in 2012, Conewango (Booth 6736) is launching Evolution X2, designed for faster milk-out.
Using new technology and a square-barrel design, the company says that the X2 can bring additional speed and efficiency to dairy operations. Other benefits of the square barrel include greater teat-end health and prevention of hyperkeratosis.
Culling decisions are one of the more difficult and complex decisions dairy producers make.
Deciding when to cull a cow involves many economic and non-economic factors.
Choosing when less-productive cows should be culled is difficult.
Many dairy owners and managers have recognized the need for some sort of risk management program to navigate through today’s volatile markets.
Like anything, you get better with practice and experience.
I recently heard a speaker that made me think about how dairy producers can become more adept at dealing with price risks and opportunities – and the consequences of not honing these skills.
In the dairy industry there are many tools available to the individual dairyman. There are operational tools such as nutritionists, TMRs, DHIA, A.I. breeding, sexed semen, calving- ease bulls and whether to milk twice, three or four times daily. The list goes on and on.
Dairy and other agricultural producers confront a variety of risks in running their operations. This article will focus on price risk, specifically on the output side – that is the price of milk received.
Over the past three decades, U.S. agricultural policy has begun to dismantle the myriad of support programs for basic farm commodities that have existed since the Great Depression.
Government policy provided strong support for milk prices with no price tag for producers until consumers began to question the program’s cost a decade ago. We are well aware of the price volatility since 2000.
Very few of today’s taxpayers and policymakers would support a return to a government-funded dairy price support program, so how can producers manage these volatile markets?
A written marketing plan should create a strategy that delivers milk price stability and cash flow security with a discipline that reduces the emotion of marketing decisions.
