Scott Druker
Senior Business Manager
Arm & Hammer Animal Nutrition Background/Experience
I can trace my interest in chemistry to a co-op job I had while in college. I had the opportunity to work ...
New Hire
Jeffrey J Sebold
Marshfield, Wisconsin
Senior Business Manager, J&D Manufacturing Please describe your agricultural background?
I have been working in Agriculture since ...
New hire
Neil Michael DVM
Madison, Wisconsin
Director of Dairy Initiatives, Vita Plus Please describe your agricultural background.
I was raised in northeast Indiana on a dairy ...
Dairy producers and their transitions cows probably have more in common right now than they usually ever have. Both are feeling stressed and strained.I imagine that if cows could talk during transition ...
For most people in the dairy industry today, extra time is not easy to come by. But for Christine Vieira of Turlock, California, there is always extra time to help America’s soldiers.
Since high school, ...
New rear-mounted cameras and strategically located convex mirrors aid us in backing up. They provide us a wider, clearer and less obstructed view of the rear. Even then, these improvements in seeing ...
Milk producers everywhere face the challenge of many different problems on their dairies. Today I am going to discuss three of those issues. They are: Downer cows, bovine pain control and animal rights ...
Editor’s note: The following is an actual conversation the author had with a Missouri dairy producer about how to deal with employees not meeting the standards of the dairy.
Missouri Dairyman: I have ...
In the past two issues of Progressive Dairyman, we have printed the pros and cons of MPC imports and shared some producer comments on the subject.
To the right are some facts about the amount of MPCs ...
Hummus, flat bread, dates and aloe-vera-flavored yogurt – traditional desert cuisine – are not my preferred continental breakfast foods. Luckily Western businessmen and tourists frequented the same Middle ...
The act of juggling objects in the air is not a skill possessed by every human. Yet, most of us can relate as we’ve juggled multiple actions, issues and challenges simultaneously.
Last month at the ...
Dairy cows just don’t have a choice. Due to their biology, they are unable to meet their energy needs during the transition from dry cow to fresh cow. Their body’s demand for glucose (energy) increases ...
This article was #1 in PDmag's Top 5 most-well read New Technology articles in 2010.
Summary: The Greenfreestall, a division of Tags4All Global Inc., has created a freestall structure that is adjustable, ...
This is the second article discussing transition cow management. In the first article (January 1, 2010), I discussed the importance of tracking the many complex cow issues associated with parturition. ...
The period three weeks before calving through three weeks after calving is, without doubt, the most critical and stressful six weeks in the lactation cycle of the dairy cow. Navigating the potential pitfalls ...
Once is an occurrence, twice could be a fluke, three times is a trend. This was my thought as I headed to a 2,000-cow Jersey dairy for the third time in a week to perform surgery on a cow with a left-displaced ...
I remember back in the 1980s when the first TMR mixer boxes started showing up. Boy, those were something. No more pushing and dragging bales of hay around by hand – dump them into a big box with your ...
With current economic trends in the dairy industry, the producer needs to ensure efficiency in all aspects of milk production. Controlling diseases, such as mastitis, and reproductive performance are both ...
This article was #16 in PDmag's Top 25 most-well read articles in 2010.
Summary: A panel of four industry experts – Doug Hammon of Pfizer Dairy Veterinary Operations, Cory Meyers of Mid-Maryland Dairy ...
The metabolic issues. Trying to manage her metabolism as she goes through that whole transition of low dry matter intake to high dry matter intake and the changes in the diet and the changes in her whole ...
Calving is not a disease, so why is freshening a significant health risk on some dairy farms? I use the following five keys to unlock bottlenecks in transition cow programs in my practice.
1) Facilities ...
In previous articles, the two most important dairy fly pests have been discussed. This article will discuss other flying pests that may be encountered on the dairy, their economic importance and possible ...
Many of the challenges the transition cow experiences are the result of internal changes to the rumen environment and hormone balance.
By looking inside the cow’s rumen and examining metabolic pathways, ...
Here is a list of 10 things I would like my dairy clients to know pertaining to their hoof trimmer and his job:
1. I would like my dairymen to remember the scheduled appointment day on which I am to arrive. ...
In today’s modern dairies, one of the most fascinating relationships is between rumen health and hoof health. This is a two-way relationship; first is the effect that hoof health or infectious lameness ...
Foot trimming and foot care are performed at two levels on your dairy: lameness correction and preventive hoof trimming. At either level, it needs to be done by trained, qualified persons. Whether foot ...
Free! Free Trial! Free for 30 days! Everywhere you turn there is an ad promoting something that is free. Of course, when you buy the product or service, you find yourself knee-deep in strings attached. ...
You may have noticed that you are losing oil but you don’t know where – all you know is that the five gallons you put in your tractor is all but gone. You don’t have an obvious leak under the tractor ...
In the fall of 2008, before the election, as the recession crashed down around us, I gave up on politics. It appeared that no one on either side, on Wall Street, in Detroit or in the media had a clue. ...
Neonatal diarrhea, more commonly known as calf scours, is the leading cause of death in dairy calves in the first month of life. Furthermore, the treatment of scours is difficult, labor-intensive, costly ...
The High Plains Dairy Conference kicked off in Amarillo, Texas, at the Ambassador Hotel March 11-12. As is customary for the conference, producers took part in two days of educational presentations and ...
Public perception of dairy, and agriculture in general, is extremely important to continuing production of food in this country. Animal welfare in particular, has become an area of great concern, and although ...
Several decisions are made daily on a dairy farm. Some involve cow and labor management, others address crop and business concerns and there are a host of others in between. Unfortunately, dairy producers ...
Calf rearing involves many processes. Caring for newborn calves, managing colostrum, feeding, dehorning preweaned calves are all examples. Each process could have a protocol – a written description of ...
As spring fever hits on these nice, sunny days, it is a good time to do a safety scan of your farm to be sure when you hit the fields you and your workforce are working in as safe an environment as possible. ...
Cowboys are nothing if not ingenious. It takes that sort of out-of-the-box mentality to allow them to solve the myriad of problems that arise when you combine horse, cow and rope! In the northeastern Montana ...
The work of research and experimentation is important for production agriculture. Advances made arise from discovering new methods, greater efficiencies and solving problems related to constraints. In ...
I’ve been speaking to a lot of organizations around the country and the one thing I keep hearing from leaders and employees is that complaining is at an all-time high. I’m not surprised. There are two ...
Created on 07 April 2010
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