This article was #15 of the Top 25 most well-read articles on www.progressivedairy.com in 2014. It was published in the Nov. 12, 2013 Extra e-newsletter. Last year, Betley Farms LLC of Pulaski, Wisconsin, harvested their first crop of sugar beets. While beet byproducts are commonly fed on dairies located in the sugar beet-producing regions of the country, Betleys’ beets were a specific hybrid geared for dairy cow nutrition.

Dairy producers, nutritionists and veterinarians now have free access to an online tool that calculates the combined intake of water and feed minerals as compared to NRC requirements. Vi-Cor Dairy Division Vice President Charlie Elrod, Ph.D., has created this web-based water quality evaluation tool that takes dairy rations one step further by accounting for minerals present in the water that cows are consuming.