Our first official Milking Parlor podcast from World Dairy Expo is with the lovely and talented “Alice in Dairyland,” aka Jill Makovec. “Alice in Dairyland is Wisconsin’s official spokesperson for agriculture,” she says. “Alice’s primary role is to educate people about the impact of agriculture here in the state.” Agriculture is a $51.5 billion industry in Wisconsin, with nearly half … Read More
Using New Media to Cover WDX
We will be bringing you daily coverage of World Dairy Expo this week here on World Dairy Diary thanks to a sponsorship package put together by Charleston-Orwig of Hartland, Wisconsin. CEO Lyle Orwig says they are a marketing and communications agency that has been serving agriculture since 1992. “We work nationally and internationally with clients who market products to producers … Read More
BASF NutriDense at WDX
One of the exhibitors at this week’s World Dairy Expo, and one of the sponsors of our coverage this year, is BASF Plant Science’s NutriDense. Jerry Weigel, with BASF Plant Sciences global nutrition and tech services, says NutriDense is a nutritionally-enhanced corn that contains a stacked set of output traits that enhance animal feed performance. “Instead of going in and … Read More
DeLaval International at IFAJ
For the third year in a row, DeLaval International sponsored the International Federation of Agricultural Journalists photo contest, presented at the annual congress, which was just held in Japan. DeLaval PR director Carina Kit presented the awards during the congress, with the help of IFAJ president David Markey. The winner was “The beauties of the winter in Schleswig-Holstein” from the … Read More
Silage Innoculants
Silage innoculants are discussed in this segment of the Pioneer Forage Forum, with information provided by Bill Rutherford, research coordinator, Pioneer Forage Additive Research Group. In addition to the much talked about L. buchneri, Rutherford provides information on organisms which also have an important role as components of silage inoculants. He explains why it is important to have multiple strains … Read More
RFID Can Reduce Labor Costs
Steven Smith with DHI-Provo demonstrated how the Pocket DHI-Plus works with RFID through a video that showed a dairy producer walking alongside his animals and scanning them. As he did that, you could hear what he was hearing in his ear piece, whether to skip the animal, whether it needed to be preg-checked, or was due for injections, or whatever … Read More
Dairy Ingredients Market Growing
There’s apparently a growing market for dairy products as ingredients. Nutrition bars would be one example. You may not have noticed, but there’s change underway in the American food industry. Dairy ingredients are showing up in an amazing array of products that you might not traditionally think of when you think of dairy. There’s more on that, as Brian Baxter … Read More
Starch in Fermented Grains
Starch in Fermented Grains is the topic of this Forage Forum segment, with information provided by Dr. Bill Mahanna, Pioneer Global Nutritional Sciences Manager. Dr. Mahanna reviews the importance of the form of corn when it is fed, especially to cattle feeders. Additionally, he weighs in on the pros and cons of high-moisture corn, focusing on the fermentation process and … Read More
Pfizer Animal Health Dairy Research
Last week I got to attend a media event at Pfizer Animal Health. They brought in a group of agricultural journalists for a behind the scenes look at their veterinary medicine research and development facility/farm in Michigan. One of the people I met was Bill Loveland. Bill manages their research dairy. Pfizer has a state of the art dairy facility … Read More
Kernel Texture
Just what exactly is kernel texture? Dr. Bill Mahanna, Pioneer Global Nutritional Sciences Manager, explores this question while comparing hard starch vs. soft starch. He also explains the link to digestibility and touches upon current Ohio State University research on corn grain and corn silage – what are the influences on feedability and what is the role of fermentation? Bill … Read More