Why ship water when you get paid for solids?

Posted on February 27, 2012 in Dairy Performance
By Dr. Eric Schwab Consumers and processors in the Upper Midwest demand solids to produce high quality dairy products. But how do we produce high solids milk without giving up production? First, let’s take a step back to understand why milk solids play such a big role in the milk check.  World demand for dairy

Goodbye protein… Hello amino acids

Posted on December 15, 2011 in Dairy Performance
By Spence Driver Over the last five years, nearly 55 percent of the average milk income over feed costs has been derived from milk protein yield and 40 percent has come from milk fat yield.  That means that only about 5 percent of that income is derived from milk volume. Clearly, that means that increasing

Optimize heifer performance with TMR management

Posted on December 2, 2011 in Dairy Performance
By Cody Yanzick Calf raisers invest a lot of time and energy into optimizing calf performance.  Good feed management with young heifers can help to keep that momentum going as calves get older.  Here are a few tips for introducing, feeding and monitoring heifer TMRs. Choose the right size mixer. Most calf raisers mix small

Getting ‘the rest of the story’ on fecal starch

Posted on September 29, 2011 in Dairy Performance
By Jon Urness Legendary commentator Paul Harvey always ended his daily lunchtime radio broadcasts with the affirmation, “Now you know the rest of the story.” I’m not so sure we’ll ever know the full “rest of the story” when it comes to all the factors affecting total tract starch digestibility.  A survey conducted by Vita

Using coproducts: Not a ‘one size fits all’ situation

Posted on September 29, 2011 in Dairy Performance
By Spence Driver The theme of high feed costs is not breaking news – we’ve been dealing with it for quite some time.  That certainly pushes us to take advantage of lower-priced coproducts whenever possible. In the Midwest, we’re fortunate in that we do have easy access to coproducts.  The Midwest is the center of

Is snaplage a fit for your dairy?

Posted on September 29, 2011 in Dairy Performance

By Chris Wacek-Driver 
Have you been talking about putting up snaplage this year?  This forage has gained renewed interest with increased use of high capacity field harvesters equipped with kernel processors.  The decision to harvest snaplage (which consists of the corn grain, cob, husk and some upper plant parts) will depend on the dietary fit and production goals of your dairy.