Feed & Nutrition

Proper silage harvest management is the key to quality feed all year long. We can’t always control or manage all aspects of harvest, but there are several we can. With forage inventories being low this year, it is more important than ever to make sure that the aspects of silage harvest we can manage, we do well.

Paying special attention to transition cows from the close-up or maternity pen to the fresh pen usually pays big dividends for the dairy producer. During no other time in a cow’s lactation cycle will she be more prone to diseases and setbacks than this short window. The big dividends paid to the dairy producer include higher milk production, maintain/minimize loss of body condition score, low incidence of metabolic disorders, minimize loss of immunocompetence, control/decrease days to first ovulation and maintain/enhance fertility after the birth of a healthy calf.

When comparing inoculants, like all other things on the farm, pricing is always a consideration, but it is important to evaluate products to see if their price is a cost or an investment.

If we look at the composition of dried distillers grains with solubles (DDGS), we see that they contain a significant amount of fiber.

Erin Mosley is owner of Mosley Dairy Consulting LLC and lives in Canal Winchester, Ohio. She provides independent dairy nutrition consultation focusing on the utilization of currently available software and technology to aid in the evaluation of feed- and cow-health-related data to help identify key areas of opportunity for production, health and financial improvement.

When asked for several years what I viewed as “normal” in production agriculture, the reply was often something to the effect, “Extreme volatility in dairy and beef margins (per hundredweight) is our normal.”