The safe consumption and distribution of milk and dairy products is highly regulated to keep customers safe. All farms are required to submit milk bulk tank samples for testing to ensure that there are no antibiotics present in the milk. When a milk tanker is contaminated, it costs farms and milk cooperatives money. That’s where services offered by a milk analysis laboratory come in to help prevent this problem from happening for dairies.

Efficiency is key to making the milking system as profitable as possible. Parlor turns can greatly impact milk collected per stall, and milkabilty measures of individual cows, like milking speed and milking duration, will impact how quickly cows make their way through the parlor.

In this episode, Lucas Fuess from Rabobank joins host Kimmi Devaney to chat about economic conditions, the factors affecting them and key insights from recent Rabobank reports related to milk production, on-farm margins and more.

Economic culling decisions can be very complex and challenging to make. Ensuring every cow that passes through the milking system holds value will help lead to increased farm profitability.

Establishing a “culture of integrity and honesty” might be something you hear in a human resource meeting, not a parlor. But for Eagle Ridge Dairy, it’s a core concept in the barn and key to maintaining a somatic cell count of 80,000.

It’s common for dairy producers to experience a “fall slump,” or a time when cows fail to reach their full production potential. Producers also might notice decreased feed intake or loose manure.