Total farm business operating expenditures amounted to more than $187 billion in 2008, according to a recent report from USDA's Economic Research Service. Nearly half of those expenditures were spent locally....
We at Hoard's decided to do June Dairy Month with a bang this year. Not only are we celebrating the 125th anniversary of our magazine with a special anniversary issue and a new Foster Mothers of the Human...
Expect gradual improvement in milk prices and margins, according to USDA's recent Livestock, Dairy, & Poultry Outlook. Corn prices are forecast to average $3.50 to $3.70 a bushel through this crop year,...
More herds will be retired this year - Cooperatives Working Together (CWT) has just announced that it will be implementing another round of herd retirements after reviewing a number of economic benchmarks,...
Now that the tax filing season is complete, farm accounting reports are beginning to be compiled and distributed to the dairy world. Those reports only quantify what we already know, 2009's losses were...
A growing A.I. trend is literally changing the look of the U.S. dairy industry: Herds are becoming more colorful. Black and white still dominates the landscape, but a gradual shift toward color is clearly...
Two releases in recent days help shed light on the milk price and feed cost scene in the months ahead. USDA's monthly World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates and USDA's Crop Production were released...
Stray voltage by its very name and nature is a difficult entity to trace. And when it is suspected of causing harm on a dairy, it can be a testy condition to eliminate. Such was the case at Bollant Farms...
There was a 30 percent drop in the value of milk marketed by dairy farmers last year, according to the USDA-NASS publication, Milk Production, Disposition, and Income released last week. That was a drop...
Domino's is a friend of ours. Last year, the well-known delivery pizza chain launched and heavily promoted (with some help from the check-off) their American Legends pizza line which came with 30 percent...
The latest USDA genetic evaluations ushered in numerous changes just three months after January's major base change. Among them were imputed female evaluations and cow evaluation adjustments which put...
Green Bay, Wis., is the site of the 5th national AgSTAR conference. For those of you unfamiliar with AgSTAR, it is a joint program between the EPA, USDA, and the U.S. Department of Energy aimed at encouraging...
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced last week that $2 million will be made available to dairy, beef, poultry, and swine producers for energy evaluations. The new agriculture energy conservation...
Advocacy for the dairy industry and agriculture isn't always easy. It takes courage to stand up to what might not be the popular majority. But, one program for dairy industry enthusiasts is teaching the...
They're black and white (or brown) on the outside, but these days there's also a golden glow to cull dairy cows. Even as milk prices continue to slip, beef prices have been moving steadily higher most...
Walmart, Wendy's, Burger King, and Subway have all jumped on the cage-free egg bandwagon. Each of these food retailers has made some sort of commitment to providing food products made with eggs from chickens...
The National Dairy Shrine is again looking for applications for its annual awarding of scholarships. Applications must be completed by May 1, 2010. Official scholarship application award forms are available...
Anyone who milks cows wants demand for their milk, and the more the better. But as producers saw all too painfully in 2008-09, expanding to meet that demand comes with risk. Recent news from the U.S. Dairy...
The 37th annual National Ag Day was held throughout the country on March 20 to celebrate the importance of agriculture in our country. As part of the celebration, seventh through twelfth grade students...
One of the most successful leaders of the purebred dairy cattle industry passed away April 6 just eight days shy of his 93rd birthday. James F. Cavanaugh joined the American Jersey Cattle Association in...
