Each year, dairymen, farmers, truckers and equipment operators spend an ever-increasing amount of money on maintenance costs. The most expensive of all maintenance repairs are those of catastrophic failures, which occur when a part on a piece of equipment fails completely and is often damaged beyond repair. Wouldn’t it be nice if there was a way to know if an engine was about to fail or a transmission on a piece of equipment was nearing its life expectancy? Because of modern chemistry, it is actually possible through a process known as oil analysis.

A skid steer is one of the most versatile pieces of equipment on a farm or ranch because it is designed to maneuver easily in tight spaces and has a variety of attachments to complete multiple jobs. Injuries from skid steer incidents can be extremely severe and include amputations, crushing injuries, mangled limbs and death.

Implementation of anaerobic digestion technology on U.S. dairies continues to stumble along. There are several reasons, with the most prevalent being economics, including: high capital costs, high or unknown operation and maintenance costs, reliability concerns and low revenues. Anaerobic digestion technology is proven to work, but the dollars and cents situation is simple reality and largely out of the control of producers. Despite the environmental benefits, a segment of producers also steer away from anaerobic digestion systems due to the perceived notion manure is the only bedding option. Here’s how sand bedding users are implementing sand-manure separation as part of digestion pretreatment.

The power take-off (PTO) shaft is an efficient means of transferring mechanical power between farm tractors and implements. This power transfer system helped to revolutionize North American agriculture during the 1930s. It is also one of the oldest and most persistent hazards associated with farm machinery. This article discusses several aspects of PTO safety.

It is common knowledge that texting while driving a car increases your risk of an accident – even talking with a hands-free device requires the brain to multitask and can be risky behavior. The same goes for driving a tractor or using other heavy equipment. Today’s tech tools – like cell phones, music devices or tablets – are “tractor distractors” and are unsafe to use while operating heavy equipment.

A cow’s comfort level affects her health, productivity and performance if not assessed routinely over time. How are you gauging the comfort level of your cows, especially when it comes to the farm’s cow housing environment, particularly freestalls? “We all understand the importance of cow comfort,” Rick Grant, president of the William H. Miner Agricultural Research Institute, says. “There’s nothing more important to the cow’s comfort in terms of her environment than her lying surface.” There are several indices currently used to determine how comfortable the animals are in relation to their housing environment. Grant points out that three of the principal indices are the cow comfort index, the stall standing index and the stall use index.