This article was #25 in PDmag's Top 25 most-well read articles in 2011. Click here to jump to the article. Click here to see "Cool stuff we saw at World Ag Expo [2012]"

Summary: This article in our March 1st issue, detailed the new and neat things editors observed while attending the world’s largest outdoor agricultural exhibition held in Tulare, California. Coverage of World Ag Expo-related activities will ramp up in the first four issues in the new year.

In our January 1st issue of 2012, Progressive Dairyman will preview the unique dairy-related events that will occur during this year’s show. A map of the dairy area of the show grounds will be inserted into the January 20th issue. And a recap of the cool stuff our editors saw will appear again in the March 1st issue.

Watch for more information about the eight dairy-specific seminars Progressive Dairyman will be hosting during the show. Several of the sessions will highlight forward-thinking dairies and their straightforward owners in virtual farm tours.

Seminar topics will include innovative feeding and nutrition strategies, employment verification tips to ensure a legal workforce, up-and-coming models for revenue from sustainability projects, a 2012 dairy market outlook and more.

[Click here or on the image above right to see the full list of the Top 25 articles of 2011. Click here to see the list from 2010.]

ARTICLE

The recent World Ag Expo provided Progressive Dairyman staff with the opportunity to learn about the latest products being offered to help solve dairy industry issues.

Here were just a few of the innovative solutions available to producers. Click a link below for more information about a specific product.

What brought about this product's creation?

These include low blood calcium and energy deficiency. High levels of B vitamins support appetite, 12 grams of niacin per dose aid liver function, glucose precursors such as propylene glycol help maintain blood glucose levels and calcium combined with other components help manage metabolic issues.

How does your product fill an industry need?
This product fills a clear need for a multi-purpose product that bridges the gap between calcium supplements and those products that supply vitamins or energy that fresh cows need.

Many products on the market contain individual components such as calcium, vitamins or energy, but this product contains all of these and a full feeding of yeast culture to support rumen function and appetite.

—Information provided by William Zimmer, DVM, President of Bio-Vet, Inc.

Click here to learn more about PaturX.

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Udder Comfort Spray-Gun

What brought about this product's creation?
The Udder Comfort Spray-Gun is run off an air compressor, and all you have to do is hold the trigger until the quarter is covered. It is less stress on the workers, and they will be more inclined to do the correct application. Plus, workers will use less product. The product comes free with the purchase of a 15-gallon drum, which is the size most large dairies will use, instead of buying several cases of spray bottles to do the same job.

How does your product fill an industry need?
It was a needed product for applying our spray in large herd dairies. The spray products are used on large-herd dairies in the fresh cow barns and the hospital pens.

The spray bottles that we have are meant for use when applying to a quarter on a few cows; 10 pulls on a quarter for a few cows is manageable for the workers. But when you have 20 to 40 fresh cows at a time — spraying on 40 pulls on the whole udder — workers get sore wrists and fingers from doing all the pulls.

—Information provided by Willy Meerakker, Udder Comfort

Click here to learn more about Udder Comfort's Spray Gun. A related video is available in both English and Spanish. 

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Intervet/Schering-Plough Animal Health's Vista vaccines

What brought about this product's creation?
Vista vaccines were created to provide disease protection for the most common and costly respiratory and reproductive diseases in cattle.

Since label claims offer limited information, developers wanted to provide veterinarians and producers with well-researched vaccines that could be used with confidence in a variety of management situations.

How does your product fill an industry need?
For product quality advantages and to accommodate a variety of management styles, there was a need to create a BQA-friendly, multi-antigen vaccine that protected against many diseases in a single dose. These vaccines are the most researched cattle vaccine available and offer the most complete protection for respiratory and reproductive diseases.

This line of vaccines is the only avirulent-live culture Mannheimia haemolytica/Pasteurella multocida protection combined with a five-way modified-live viral. It is also is the only vaccine labeled for BVD Type 1 and Type 2 protection throughout the entire pregnancy, offering complete fetal protection. Its unique technology also helps lead to a more complete and comprehensive immune response in a low-stress way with no impact on milk production when administered to cows.

—Information provided by Dr. Scott Nordstrom, Intervet/Schering-Plough Animal Health

Click here for an overview of Vista vaccines.

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ParlorPro's iPrep app

What brought about this product's creation?
The iPrep app is part of a larger family of apps that make up the ParlorPro program. It seemed to be a logical choice to have iPrep converted to a single, stand-alone app since it’s easy-to-use and doesn’t involve a whole lot of content.

There is an interface screen for entering data and a screen that displays results (prep lag times, kill times, unit on times and prep procedures) that are automatically calculated.

The results screen is also formatted for distributing via email. The simplicity of this app allows us to keep the price under $5, which makes it not only easy to use, but also extremely appealing to anyone evaluating prep procedures, regardless of how often they plan to do so.

How does your product fill an industry need?
The app gives every dairyman the opportunity to monitor their prep procedure with limited time invested. Virtually everyone has a cell phone now, and most of those are smartphones.

We take a program that simplifies analyzing a prep procedure by eliminating pen and paper, reentering data in a computer, performing calculations and creating reports, and offer it to anyone who has a smartphone.

Now you don’t have to hire someone to evaluate your prep procedure, or spend $1000-plus on a program that has more bells and whistles than you’ll ever need. This makes it appealing to any dairyman, herdsman, parlor manager and consultant, knowing that they don’t have to spend over $5 and can accomplish something in minutes instead of hours.

—Information provided by Aaron Kochman, Research &  Development Engineer, ParlorPro administrator

Click here to visit ParlorPro's website.

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DeLaval’s Voluntary Milking System (VMS)

What brought about this product's creation?  
Customers. Enhancing the possibilities for remote and virtual monitoring and management of our automatic milking solution, VMS, as well as the individual cow and herd, seemed a natural progression.

Embracing, optimizing and incorporating wireless capabilities allows the owner, manager and service technician to not only observe, but adjust the performance levels of the entire system without physically sitting at a desk, PC and/or visiting the barn which offers all members of the team peace of mind.

Utilizing applications and programs accessible via a smartphone or similar compatible device enhances the efficiency, time management and productivity for all involved while delivering peace of mind.

How does your product fill an industry need?  
In this day and age, everyone is busy, and one’s ability to multi-task is fast becoming a necessity. At DeLaval, we believe it’s all about the dairy producer doing more with less – less time, less inputs, less energy while achieving greater performance through accurate data presented in a clear, concise and accessible way.

A perfect example of this is the clients, a couple from Illinois who attended World Ag Expo February 8-10, 2011. They use four DeLaval VMS to milk their cows. During the course of their week visit at WAE, one of our specialists logged in to their herd management software and analyzed/discussed their KPIs.

When you think about it, to conduct this analysis in the previous manner, such a discussion would have no doubt required a number of phone calls and emails to schedule an appointment suitable with everyone’s calendars, hours spent traveling, then a visit on-site that would have some number of interruptions maybe two or three weeks away.

Instead, consultation real time when most convenient for all, in this case hundreds of miles from the dairy but as though being on the farm, tweaking reports to better meet the needs of the users and their management team, examining the trends in milk production gains and reproduction makes for more timely and accurate determinations. This is simply about farming in a smarter way, or at least having the freedom to do so.

—Information provided by Mark Futcher, Marketing Manager, DeLaval

Click here to visit DeLaval's VMS website.

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Promat, Inc.'s Pasture Gel Mat

What brought about this product's creation?  
Our biggest competitor is sand bedding. So we developed the gel mat to act like sand where a cow that would have walked in and stepped on a cushion of sand will now step on a nice cushion of gel.

Unlike the waterbed that is out in the market, where the water sloshes around and the water moves from side to side and end to end, this gel does not slosh around or shift rapidly like water would. So, we’ve tried to mimic the feel of sand, using gel in a contained environment.

How does your product fill an industry need?  
It’s hard to sell a dairy cow mattress in this day and age without having experience – without having it in the field, on the farm and under the cow. We not only manufacture and sell dairy cow mattresses all over the world but we also conduct a lot of scientific research.

With this product, we have used real time digital pressure point body mapping technology. Our goal is to have this mattress form and adjust to every cow. What we are doing is we are looking at where the pressure points on the cow are and making adjustments to make the mattress as comfortable for the cow as possible.  PD

—Information provided by Andy Jenkins, General Manager, Promat, Inc. Photos courtesy of Promat.

Click here to visit the Promat website.

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