The employment rate in rural America is slowly recovering after the recession. Many of us working in agriculture, myself included, grew up in the country. I think most "country kids" would agree that small...
Your lighting decisions affect animals at all ages, not just lactating dairy cows. A recent Kentucky Cooperative Extension paper reminds us of the importance of both long-day and short-day photoperiods...
Comfortable cows or easily maintained manure systems. It seems like many dairy producers feel they must choose between one or the other. Sand has a strong reputation for enhancing cow comfort and lowering...
The more a cow produces, the lower its environmental footprint will be. Climate change has always occurred. Yet, the heating trend over the last decade has been outside the normal range. Humans and livestock...
MUCH more than meets the eye has gone into making "the queen of forages." Looks are deceiving when it comes to what is perhaps dairy producers' favorite cattle feed. Alfalfa is known to date back at least...
Some are already gone. More will follow. The big question is, how many can be saved? The greatest milk-producing machine the U.S. dairy industry has ever seen is breaking down. Doomsday feed prices and...
In North America, there are many native ruminants, that is, herbivore animals with a complex digestive system, a major compartment of which is the rumen. Some present-day examples are the bison (Bison...
This past weekend, Fort Atkinson Wis., the home of Hoard's Dairyman, hosted the second annual Fort Atkinson Half-Marathon, with over 500 participants. Once again, the Barnyard Clovers, a local 4-H club...
In recent years, it seems that more opinions have given credence to the notion that raising high-producing cows in freestall barns, storing manure in lagoons, and storing silage in bunkers are all better...
Building a new barn may seem like a glamorous idea. Eventually, you may end up with a sparkly, beautiful new barn, but not until going through countless stressful decisions. What size will the stalls be?...
When I think of global hunger issues, only one name comes to mind: Norman Borlaug. In college, I never stopped hearing about him - he was an alumni of my alma mater. Borlaug was the winner of the Nobel...
