The extremely volatile economic situation experienced over the last few years underscores the need for effective record-keeping and sound business planning. The time to start is now. I have compiled a list of steps producers should consider taking as the year winds down. 1. Evaluate and reconcile your accounting system. The accounting system should be reconciled on a regular basis throughout the year, but on many dairy farms it isn’t completed until an accountant prepares the farm’s income taxes. Even then, depending on the firm you hire, a complete reconciliation may not be done.

While cleaning up around the farm, it is a good time to take a look for possible chemical contaminants that could impact the health of your animals or the safety of the products they produce. Dairy farmers are aware and diligent about avoiding antibiotic residues, but a multitude of other chemicals exists that also could end up in animals and contaminate milk and meat. Environmental hazards, pesticides and herbicides as well as feed contamination issues should be kept on your chemical residue awareness radar screen. Recent accidental exposure of cattle to chemical hazards include accidental exposure to high doses of Rumensin®, anhydrous ammonia, benzene from gasoline, organophosphate insecticides and feed-grade antibiotics. In each of these cases, quick action prevented any food safety issues and limited animal health consequences. If a chemical contamination event on farm is discovered or suspected, immediately notify your veterinarian or the Department of Agriculture in your state.

In the many years writing this column, now just a year short of two full decades, I have written of expeditionary work. By my last count, the effort and energy spent in a dozen countries along with situational analysis are described here. As a young farm boy, FFA member and college student in the late ’60s and early ’70s, I fully expected to farm the rest of my life.

Maximizing nutrient utilization is at the heart of profitability for a dairy farm. A cow fed a highly digestible diet will produce more milk on less feed and excrete less manure. “The only way to really affect profit is by improving efficiency of production,” said Elliot Block, senior manager of technology for Arm & Hammer Animal Nutrition. One way to be more efficient is to consider ways to maximize the nutrients fed.

The yellow leaves of autumn are sprinkling the trees. Soon they will be full-blown orange and red. The world will be a panorama of beauty. Summer will be forgotten, and thoughts of winter will come with the chill of breezes that shake the dappled trees. It makes me think of a Shakespeare sonnet I memorized in an acting class when I was in college.