Category: Forage Laboratory

Dairy One Forage Lab: What’s in Your Feed?

When farmers need to know exactly what their cow is eating, one solution is the Dairy One Forage Laboratory. This lab and its team are dedicated to providing an analysis report on forage samples they receive from individuals, ranging from dairy farmers to nutritionists to zoos and aquariums. Today we’ll

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Putting Your Best Sample Forward

Analysis can only be as good as the sample that was submitted. For the most accurate results, every effort should be made to ensure that the sample truly reflects and characterizes the material to be analyzed. There are a few things to keep in mind when collecting the optimal sample

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Our Fall Feed Management Picks

It is a great time of year to re-visit some basic feeding tools. Our Dairy One team shares some of their tips and insights on which services they think will have the biggest impact on your fall feed management. Forage Analysis To properly manage your feed program it’s essential to

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Is Your Mixer Leaving Money on the Bunk Floor?

Feed costs are the highest single operating expense on dairy farms today. They are also the greatest opportunity for expense savings on a farm by focusing on the difference between milk revenue and feed costs, or your income over feed costs (IOFC). An immense amount of time and money goes

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Farmer Focused Forage Team

Mike Reuter, Director of Analytical Services Mike Reuter has been a part of the Dairy One Forage Lab team for the last 34 years. As director of analytical services for the forage and soils labs, his primary role is providing leadership and oversight to those teams. An important part of

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Get your forage and soil results faster

A key factor in getting fast and accurate results is proper sample submission. Samples that are collected properly, labeled clearly, and submitted with all of the needed information can be processed most efficiently. Missing information is one of the key reasons sample results get delayed. Samples that are submitted without

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4 Ways to Get Your Forage Samples to the Lab

The first step in getting timely sample results is a timely arrival of samples to the lab. Recent USPS delays have slowed the submission process of some samples. While this does not affect the time it takes to analyze samples once they arrive, it does delay the start of that

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Money from MUN

Dr. Chris Dutton, VMD Since rolling out our new MUN report earlier this summer, we’ve had some questions on how the information provided can be applied to pasture based or grazing herds. Dr. Chris Dutton, a member of Integrated Farming Solutions Support Team, was one of the team members involved

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Couriers To Count On

The transportation and courier system covers about 14 states and is comprised of 25-30 couriers who drive more than 160,000 miles per month. This is the method by which the majority of Dairy One DHIA samples and bulk tank producer payment samples end up at the Dairy One Milk Laboratory

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NIR Relations

Near Infrared Reflectance spectroscopy, or NIR, is an effective and efficient method of analysis, used most commonly in the agricultural and pharmaceutical industries.  In the pharmaceutical world, NIR is used as more of a quality assurance method while in agriculture it is used to analyze the nutrients present in feed

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Service with a Smile

Nestled in the back corner of the building there is a little office where any samples from hay and corn silage to eels and banana trees are entered into the Dairy One Laboratory System to begin their nutrient analysis journey. This is home to our Forage Lab Customer Support group,

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Monitoring Dry Matter for Corn Silage Harvest

Sally Flis, Ph.D. – Feed and Crop Support Specialist It is that time of the year again, corn is almost ready for chopping. Harvesting corn silage for the maximum quality and best fermentation requires monitoring and management. The first factor to check is whole plant dry matter. Corn silage should

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What is your measure of shrink really measuring?

Sally A. Flis, Ph.D. – Feed and Crop Support Specialist, Dairy One When we discuss silage pile shrink, most of the time we are talking about wet weight shrink, which is measured as the difference between the amount of feed delivered to the bunk at harvest versus the amount of

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Are your cows getting enough water this winter?

We tend to only think about water intake in the summer when temperatures are increasing and increased intake is needed to help with cooling. In the winter, water intake can also increase due to increased intake to meet energy needs.  Additionally, freezing water lines, water bowls, or water troughs can

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4 Things to Think About Before A Fall Cutting

Fall is here! Are you considering taking another cut of hay? Here are 4 Things to Think About Before Taking a 4th or 5th Cut of Hay: 1. Stand Health – Crop Rotation Plan – A late fall cutting of hay, especially alfalfa, can have a detrimental effect on the

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