“Come on! Go in the parlor!” your herdsman yells at Cow #216, who won’t go into the milking parlor again. Most who have worked with cows have experienced this frustration at some point in time. Sometimes it seems that some cows are bound and determined not to cooperate.

Large quantities of wholesome, quality milk are the major goals of dairy producers. However, dairymen also contribute to the beef supply each year through elimination of market (cull) cows and bulls. Approximately one-third of the total non-fed beef production originates from dairy cows, and one-half of all cows processed for beef in the U.S. are dairy cattle.

Employment by its very nature requires that managers and supervisors place performance expectations on employees to ensure business success. Very often however, managers are so consumed by what their expectations are for the people that work for them, they often fail to see supervision as a two-way street.

If you talk to most producers, they would love to repeat 2008 again this year. Even though inputs were high, income was also higher. Unfortunately, 2009 is going to be almost a polar opposite in many aspects. That’s the bad news. The good news is hay growers still retain the ability to harvest quality hay, price it according to their needs and market it freely to hay consumers. Hay producers are not tied directly to commodity markets that rise and fall on futures and speculation. Being in control has risks, but in a down market, control is one thing that remains a favorable condition.

Q. What does sustainability mean?

The economic silver lining for many businesses has been lower commodity prices. Unless, of course, you locked in commodity inputs at a high price without protections against a price drop.

There are many factors that influence forage variability. Weather, location and time of harvest are a few.

It is not uncommon to hear about conception rates being around 20 percent, especially on large dairies.

Getting cows pregnant has multiple financial benefits, including another lactation and additional replacement heifers.

Although many years of research and use have proven rBST (Posilac) safe to the cow and the consumer, as well as effective in increasing the efficiency of milk production (increase milk yield 10 to 15 percent), an effort to remove this efficacious biotechnology from the dairy farmer’s repertoire is ongoing and gaining traction.