Editor’s note: At Progressive Dairyman’s press deadline, more than 1,830 dairy cows in Washington’s Yakima Valley reportedly perished as a winter storm hit the county, dumping up to 2 feet of snow and carrying 30- to 80-mile-per-hour winds.

A recent newsletter from the Federal Reserve district of Chicago, summarizing survey responses from commercial ag bankers in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan and Wisconsin, said the region’s dairy sector was under the most stress of any in agriculture. Nonetheless, like spring, some optimism is emerging.

The two dairy behemoths on the opposite ends of the Southwest – Texas and California – have been on somewhat divergent paths over the past couple of years.

Profitability and equity erosion continue to be a concern in the Northeast, according to Zach Myers, former North Carolina dairy farmer who is now the dairy risk education manager for Pennsylvania’s Center for Dairy Excellence.

When final numbers are in, 2018 milk production in the 10 Southeast states will be down about 4 percent from 2017, according to Calvin Covington, retired dairy co-op executive.

The past four years have been financially challenging for U.S. dairy farmers. That’s a relatively long time without a “good” year to give some relief.

When calves are fed twice a day and housed in individual pens or hutches, the morning feeder is greeted by loud bawling of calves anxiously awaiting their morning meal. It may have been more than 12 hours since their last meal of 2 quarts of milk or milk replacer.

Water – which makes up 86 percent of a newborn calf’s bodyweight – is the most important nutrient for dairy calves, but it is often overlooked.

Nobody would buy the cheapest lumber, hire the cheapest carpenters who use the cheapest tools but still expect to have the finest cabinetry built.

Raising replacement heifers is the second-highest cost to a dairy enterprise, making up nearly 20 percent of production costs. More than 15 percent of that total cost is incurred during the first two months of life, when milk replacer makes up a large portion of nutrient intake.