Jan. 1, 2017, will bring about two big changes for the dairy industry. First, the Veterinary Feed Directive (VFD) will go into effect, requiring a VFD from a licensed veterinarian for all medically important antibiotics administered in feed.

Incoming executive vice presidentAmerican Association of Bovine Practitioners For the first time in 11 years, the American Association of Bovine Practitioners (AABP) will have a new executive vice president.

Mastitis represents a major economic challenge for dairy farmers. Additionally, it’s no secret that antibiotic usage in food animals is a hot-button issue with consumers. For dairy cattle, mastitis treatment represents an avenue of antibiotic usage.

“It is important to sit down with your veterinarian at least twice a year to review vaccination protocol,” said Patrick Gorden, DVM, with Iowa State University’s College of Veterinary Medicine.

For the fresh cow, the entire transition period is a series of stress events.

“When it boils down to it, as one veterinarian put it at AABP, ‘Veterinarians have made our living responding to death, disease and destruction.’ We need to change that model,” Jennifer Walker said at the 2015 Western Canadian Dairy Seminar in Red Deer, Alberta.

Back in the day, I studied Greek theater. As many of you know, the Greeks performed in huge outdoor amphitheaters, so they used gigantic masks equipped with megaphones to portray their characters. The modern word hypocrisy came from those masks.

It’s no secret that a healthy machine translates to increased uptime and efficiency on your farm. Therefore, implementing a strong maintenance strategy and preserving the machine’s hydraulic system are critical. However, it’s easy to overlook the hydraulic system when completing machine walk-arounds, as it’s not always visible from checkpoint areas.

Working in silos. No, not the kind that hold feed – the metaphoric kind we do unconsciously where we stay in our comfort zone, in our own little area of the world, doing the daily grind in the same place and surrounding ourselves with the same people, day in and day out.

In laymen’s terms, what does MUN stand for? MUN stands for milk urea nitrogen and is commonly found on every farmer’s bulk tank readings. MUNs of 5 or lower should be of concern, as the protein being fed may not be enough to meet the needs of rumen bacteria.