Pioneer director of alfalfa research, David Miller, discusses Pioneer brand alfalfa varieties, traits and testing to help producers put the right product on the right acre.
Listen to the podcast here:
[audio:http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3?http://zimmcomm.biz/pioneer/pioneer-podcast-71-wdd.mp3] David Miller on alfalfa varieties (4:00 min MP3)To see all archived Pioneer Forage Forum podcasts, click here.
As dairy farmers, we know where milk comes from (our cows), but many consumers want to know more precise information, such as the plant that their milk was bottled. Brigham Young University senior, Trevor Fitzgerald, has created a Web site with the answers!
Fitzgerald did not grow up on a dairy farm, but says he was interested finding out where his food comes from.
The information on the site originated from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, but Fitzgerald says it was being made available in a several-hundred page PDF document that was difficult to navigate. Hoping to make the information more accessible and easier to navigate for consumers, Fitzgerald built the Web site.
Consumers can now enter the code found on their dairy products, and the Web site lists where the product originated from.
Dairy products from milk and cheese to yogurt, sour cream and cottage cheese are included.
Fitzgerald says traffic to the Web site has been growing rapidly.
Source: Dairy Herd Management
Lawrence H. Wentzell Sr’s glass milk bottle collection is one that many would envy. The Massachusetts man collected almost 2,500 milk bottles, starting with bottles from his family’s dairy, S. H. Wentzell & Sons Pioneer Dairy. Mr. Wentzell’s family is searching for a collector or a museum interested in taking the collection. Click here for the entire story.
For years the stories were enough family history to satisfy Mr. Wentzell. But then, around the time he retired from one of his two jobs in the early 1990s, he thought it might be nice to find an actual tangible piece of that history and he began a search for milk bottles from the family’s dairy. He found some and learned that collecting milk bottles could become a passion-filled hobby.
He expanded his collection to include other bottles from the city and, before long, the area. And as is wont to happen with collectors of things, eventually he expanded again and started searching out bottles from around Massachusetts.
With the man who most loved the bottles gone, the Wentzell family has pondered what to do with the 2,500 or so specimens he’d lovingly collected. They checked with local historical societies and museums, and a collector did buy a few that he badly wanted. Still, it’s too large a collection for any one place to take.
“If we could keep some part of the collection together,” Mrs. Wentzell said, “I think he would want that. We don’t have to sell them. I just want to do the right thing.”
Mrs. Wentzell said she knows her husband had talked with a fellow collector about what would happen to their bottles should something happen to him, but she’s not sure they ever decided anything specific. Friends are helping her look for appropriate places to donate some of the collection, places where the bottles will be seen and appreciated, but it has not been easy.
Source: Kim Ring, Telegram & Gazette
Photo Credit: T&G Staff Photos/Steve Lanava
The U.S. Department of Agriculture has issued a final decision to amend the producer-handler definition in all federal milk marketing orders.
These amendments were considered in a recommended decision published Oct. 21, 2009.
This decision amends the producer-handler definition of all federal milk marketing orders to limit exemption from pooling and pricing provisions of the orders to those producer-handlers with total route disposition and sales of packaged fluid milk products to other plants of 3 million pounds or less per month.
These amendments are subject to producer approval before they can be implemented on a permanent basis. The final decision amends all federal milk marketing orders. Each amended federal order must be approved either by two-thirds of producers supplying milk to the federal order or by producers who supply two-thirds of the milk to that order. If approved, USDA will issue a final rule.
Source: USDA
With Friday here, and the Northeast dealing with yet more snow, here’s a fun way to gear up for the weekend. The Hershey Company has released a “wrap” video featuring the Sniper Twins.
“We do a lot of wrapping with a ‘W.’ It’s an intentional play on words,” Hershey spokeswoman Jody Cook said of the new rap music video the company collaborated on this year.
It’s any chocolatier’s sweet dream. Titled “Chocolate Shoppe,” the music video, posted last week on YouTube, features Hershey employees rolling around the factory on office chairs, cocooning themselves in foil and spitting rhymes about dancing the “chocolate drop.”
Part of a strategy to reach a younger demographic through viral marketing and social media, Hershey teamed with the Sniper Twins, a New York City rap duo that has produced parody hip-hop clips about salad and computers.
In December, the Fortune 500 business opened the doors of its West Hershey Plant to Barry Flanagan, 28, and Dax Martinez-Vargas, 27. Seventeen factory workers performed in the video, Flanagan said. While some of the video performers, such as the “chocolate cop,” work for Hershey, no company executives make an appearance, Cook said.
“We hope everyone realizes this is supposed to be fun and a parody,” Cook said.
“It’s the coolness,” Flanagan said. “It’s really cool. For Hershey’s to get onboard with a hip-hop or rap song says a lot about their cool level.”
Source: Patriot News/Penn Live.com
The History Channel will be highlighting Pennsylvania’s Marburger Farm Dairy and its famous buttermilk on the channel’s “Food Tech”. The episode will be broadcast on March 4 at 9:00 p.m. EST.
Food Tech host and self-proclaimed food connoisseur Bobby Bognar travels around the country breaking down exactly where and how food gets from the ground, farm or even factory all the way to the plate. Last year, for a segment on how buttermilk is made, he visited the Marburger Farm Dairy in Evans City.
“They were there for almost a whole day filming for a seven-minute segment on the hour-long show,” said sales representative Rita Marburger Reifenstein. “Instead of 15 minutes of fame, we have seven. We’re very excited.”
“A lot of people love their buttermilk. It’s a specialty item,” Ms. Reifenstein says on the show. “Older people remember it from their youth when grandma used to make it.”
Marburger Farm Dairy has been known for its buttermilk for well over 30 years, and in a recent competition was ranked in the top three in the U.S. The show doesn’t reveal any trade secrets, but Mr. Bognar tries his hand at milking a cow and adding the culture to the machinery that churns the milk.
Source: Pittsburgh Post Gazette
Check out our fun new turquoise t-shirts that we received for being a part of the youth seminar at the 2010 Great Lakes Regional Dairy Conference! Celeste Laurent and myself focused on getting the kids excited about who they are and where they come from. Being young people ourselves, we can relate to the challenges kids sometimes face in being different from their peers because they live on a farm.
Growing up, I got teased a lot for living on a farm and liking things like 4-H and FFA. Obviously, today I don’t have these issues, and I really don’t care if people were to tease me, but at a young age where being popular and fitting in are huge, it can sometimes be difficult to stay excited about farming and ranching.
Overall, it was a great youth seminar with lots of participation from the kids. I truly enjoyed my time in Michigan working with the future of the dairy industry!
Dairyline Markets In Review
Cash cheese prices lost more ground in the final week of February. The blocks closed Friday at $1.34 per pound, down 7 1/4-cents on the week, but are still 16 1/2-cents above a year ago when the blocks plunged 13 1/2 cents, to $1.1750. Barrel cheese closed Friday at $1.29, down 8 3/4-cents on the week, but 11 cents above a year ago.
The losses were on top of the previous week’s declines of 9 1/4 and 6 3/4-cents respectively. Thirty one loads of block traded hands on the week and 15 of barrel. The lagging NASS-surveyed U.S. average price on block cheese gained 0.4 cent, hitting $1.5059. Barrel averaged $1.5005, down 0.9 cent.
Butter closed February at $1.4050 per pound, up 4 1/2-cents on the week, and 25 1/2-cents above a year ago. Thirteen cars sold on the week and the NASS butter price averaged $1.3407, down a penny . NASS nonfat dry milk averaged $1.0697, down 7.2 cents, and dry whey averaged 39.46 cents, down 0.1 cent.
Provided courtesy of Dairyline.
“Little Miss Muffet, sat on her tuffet, eating her curds and whey.” This was how Teresa Crook opened up the youth session at the 2010 Great Lakes Regional Dairy Conference in Frankenmuth, MI earlier this month. Crook explained what whey protein is and where whey protein can be found.
Interestingly, whey protein can be found in oatmeal, hot chocolate, pudding, Doritos, protein bars, Cheez whiz and more! It’s amazing just how much dairy cattle impact our daily lives without us even knowing it! Crook’s youth seminar was a hit because she had taste samples of all of her products in the speech! Definitely a crowd pleaser!
Celeste Laurent and myself followed Crook’s presentation with our own segment in the youth program. Stop back for an update on our session!
Congratulations to Melissa Erdman, the new Michigan Senior Dairy Ambassador! Melissa is currently a student at Michigan State University, where she is on the path to become a veterinarian. Melissa impressed the judges with her extensive knowledge of the dairy industry, her passion for dairy products and her communication skills in explaining her depth of knowledge and passion with the judges. In the interview, she identified the two weaknesses facing the dairy industry as lack of consumer trust in dairy production and profitability (or lack thereof) for producers. Her proposed dairy project will focus on senior citizens and teaching them the importance of dairy as a part of a balanced diet.
Congratulations also goes to the new Michigan Junior Dairy Ambassador, Sarah Michalek. Sarah is a high school student who believes in putting 110% in everything she does. Her drive, passion and determination really convinced the judges that she would be an ideal candidate for the ambassador program. She hopes to study food science in the future, and she identified dairy public relations and fluctuating prices as two challenges facing the dairy industry. Her proposed dairy promotion project was titled, “Milk, Unlike Any Udder,” and it focused on working with students in grade six, and it included a milk label design contest.
Cheers to Melissa and Sarah, and best of luck in your year promoting dairy products to consumers! I’m confident you will do an awesome job! (Photo courtesy of Celeste Laurent)
