Dairy producers who invested in risk management through the Dairy Margin Coverage (DMC) program in 2021 are going to see some hefty returns right out of the gate.

With producer milk checks inequitably influenced by current milk marketing and pricing practices, a grassroots dairy farmer effort is growing louder in its call to seek and implement reforms to the Federal Milk Marketing Order (FMMO) system.

Digest Highlights

• AMPI, First District Association form common marketing agency
• Harden succeeds Vilsack as USDEC president and CEO
• FARM Program publishes 2020 year in review
• March 2021 Class I base: $15.20 per cwt
• U.S. dairy export outlook slips a little
• Good Culture partners with DFA on Path to Pasture program
• Things you might have missed

When you sit down to design your new freestall dairy, it is wise to consider your choice of ventilation early on in the process. The type of ventilation used will impact how the facility is designed to produce the optimal environment for your herd.

Before discussing subclinical hypocalcemia, it is helpful to review the more obvious disease of clinical hypocalcemia, or what everyone knows as milk fever. This disease can occur in mature dairy cows within three days after calving.

Do you ever feel like the age of genomics has made dairy cattle breeding more complicated? Or perhaps more scientific? While genomics brought us accelerated progress, it has also introduced us to a range of terms previously used by scientists alone.