Optimum forage quality is critical with grain, commodity and forage prices at historic highs. Relative feed value (RFV) was a ranking tool useful in the past. It incorporates ADF and NDF to estimate intake and digestion.

An article published in the Journal of Agromedicine provides a summary of the frequency and characteristics of deaths related to on-farm manure storage and handling facilities for the period 1975 – 2004. Sources included published government reports, national and local media, online searches, published farm fatality reports and prior litigation.

Every year, a hefty dairy cow tucked away in a snug barn produces more than 20,000 pounds of milk, along with an impressive amount of manure and an array of gases. New modeling work by an Agricultural Research Service team in University Park, Pennsylvania, suggests that a dairy cow living year-round in the great outdoors may leave a markedly smaller ecological hoofprint than her more sheltered sisters.

Few technologies are currently available to effectively treat and/or dispose of dairy washwater, particularly for dairies without a waste storage facility. Dairy washwater contains milk and animal waste, resulting in a wastewater source with high oxygen demand and a significant nutrient content posing environmental concern for ground and surface water. Small quantities reaching water sources can result in fish kills, algae blooms and aquatic habitat destruction.

Trending topic article: Manure This article, written by Editor Karen Lee, was chosen as 2011 Editors’ Pick. It was selected as a trending Manure topic article for the March 21, 2012 issue. to jump to the article below. Lee describes Minnesota dairy producer Jon Johnson taking advantage of a unique way to manage manure with sand bedding. He’s using a system where the manure is scraped from barns over a ledge into a storage area. From there, the liquids seep toward screen-lined towers where they are drained via pipes into a liquid storage basin. The process occurs by gravity and without any moving parts.

(Click here to listen to the podcast of this column.) When I was a child, I memorized an axiom written in the 1800s by Joseph Smith. This statement became the golden thread that wove the tapestry of my philosophy regarding literature and media.

I was 12 when I first started milking. I stood on the rusted steps and looked into the parlor. Yellow rubber hoses throbbed in unison and squirmed against the lip of the pit when milk flashed through them. Each inflation grabbed the teat it held and softened its grip only for a moment before squeezing it again.

Darci O’Brien Hixton, Wisconsin Dairy Specialist Vita Plus – Loyal