The last two or three months have certainly brought extreme challenges and difficulties to our personal and business lives like we have never seen before. The need to produce and ship less milk during a time of depressed milk prices has caused dairy farm owners and managers to make difficult decisions, many of which are […]

2020 has seen some unprecedented markets, actions, and now mandates reducing the amount of milk sold by a farm. While there are many options to accomplish reducing milk volume for the short-term, it is important not to make drastic decisions, but to consider what is best for your operation. A combined approach of culling cows […]

Strong milk components have been and always should be an important topic to discuss on dairies.  In no specific order, here are some fundamental points I think about, check, or look at when this topic is brought up. Know the intakes of the cows! There are many factors that are unknown if you don’t know […]

With COVID-19 keeping us at home, here are some things you can look at to check progress on your Lely® farm with a robotic milking system.  Here are my favorite reports to review (in no particular order). Report 43P: This report graphs each cow’s daily milk weight by her days in milk and color codes […]

It is every livestock farm’s desire to feed high-quality corn silage, high moisture corn and/or earlage to ensure excellent animal health and production. Did you get your corn silage or high moisture corn put up under ideal conditions this past fall?  I’m guessing for most of you the answer is “NO.”  With the crazy fall […]

Growing up on a dairy farm in Northwest Wisconsin, I got to see firsthand how much of a team effort farming really is. In addition to family members and employees, there was a constant variety of different consultants around that were trying to help improve, inform, and meet goals as easily and cost effectively as […]

You need to get your cows off and running at optimum speed early in lactation for the best return of investment and high profits. The transition period (21 days before and 21 after calving) has a huge impact on overall lactation production. For instance, peak milk is an excellent way to monitor transition period management […]

When you hear the word “transition,” do you automatically think of your pre- and post-fresh cows? Most dairymen do, but there’s another important transition group that requires your attention. That group is made up of calves transitioning off milk and onto a diet made up of dry feeds. Not only are they going through a […]

The dairy industry has seen many improvements over the years in dairy nutrition: forage production, harvesting, and storage, cattle facilities, animal husbandry, reproduction programs, milking equipment and procedural strategies, and various management techniques.  These changes and improvements have resulted in updated ‘thumb rules’ and benchmarks that guide dairy managers, employees, and consultants in managing and […]

Written by: Adam Fellbaum, Form-A-Feed Nutrition & Production Specialist We all know that our cows become stressed in the summer heat and when they become stressed, it impacts our bottom line. There are long and short-term effects and the goal of every dairy producer should be to minimize these effects on their operation. Whatever kind […]

Written by: Mario Solis Flores, Form-A-Feed Technical Services Specialist In many farm operations, it is normal to see owners, leaders or managers get very busy with the day-to-day operations depending on the time of the year. In many circumstances, employee issues arise during the busiest times of the year or when we least expect or […]

Have you ever been overwhelmed with everything that needs to be done or improved today or this week?  I know I have.   What have you found that works the best for you to get things done on time?  What have you found that works to make the necessary improvements and measure results? It is time […]