Autumn is here and it is time to begin analyzing last year’s hybrids and begin planning which ones to plant next year. This, of course, is the most important decision of the year. Mundane topics such as who to vote for and whether to root for the Packers or someone else (people actually root for teams other than the Packers!?!?), pale in comparison. It is also a good time to revisit the Better Continue Reading
Foraging Ahead Articles
Repeat Winners at the 2023 World Dairy Expo
The 2023 World Dairy Expo (WDE) just wound up with some notable repeat winners. First of all, Erbacres Snapple Shakira ET, a Holstein cow who lives in Quebec, but was bred in Illinois (just a few miles south of me here in Wisconsin) claimed her second Supreme Champion awasrd for Ferme Jacobs and partners. Shakira last won the WDE Supreme Champion award in 2021 The other championship repeat Continue Reading
Nitrogen – Not to be Wasted!
The Chesapeake watershed, including most of Maryland, Virginia, and Delaware, plus even parts of West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York, and the real swamp, Washington DC, through the James, York, Rappahannock, Potomac, Paturxent, Patapsco, Susquehanna, Pocomoke, Wicomico, Nanticoke, Choptank, and Chester (that was a mouthful!) rivers, has long been carefully watched and managed. Likewise, with Continue Reading
Feeding Weeds, Chapter Two
In the last newsletter, we questioned why somebody at a major Agronomy Journal (back near the turn of the century!) thought Italian Ryegrass was a weed. And in that article, we documented research that established some exceptionally good reasons why this particular weed---Italian ryegrass---is a good weed to grow from an agronomic standpoint. This work was done by Dr. Dan Undersander, UW-Madison Continue Reading
High Quality Weeds as a Forage for High-Producing Dairy Cows
This article is probably not exactly what you may think but read on! Dr. Matt Akins Research Scientist and Asst. Professor at the UW-Marshfield, heard about a paper from just slightly after the turn of the century(!) which promoted some of the benefits of modern European genetic cool season grasses and in this case Italian Ryegrass. It was not forthcoming so we (at this time, Dr. Akins involved Continue Reading
Hey, Finally Something Good About Alfalfa!
If you have been reading our newsletter and listening to Daniel’s Facebook site you may not expect this from us, but here goes. For the last twenty years or so, Daniel and some others at Byron Seed, LLC (where most of the seed used by Forage Innovations clients get the seed) have been working on an idea that has finally earned its due. I guess it already had believers from our side and with the Continue Reading
Photoperiod Sensitive – What’s the Scoop?
Photoperiod Sensitive (PPS) Sorghum Sudan (SxS) crosses are a useful forage for dry cows and heifers. PPS is a Non-GMO trait of the sorghum family. The trait prevents the plant from going reproductive (heading out) until the daylight gets shorter than 12 hours and 20 minutes. This occurs each year about mid-September (depending on your latitude). If we want the highest dairy-quality forage, SxS Continue Reading
uNDF240, the New Lignin
One of the biggest advancements in feed analysis from our forage testing labs has been the addition of uNDF240 as a measure of indigestibility. While NDFD30 is an estimate of the amount of fiber digested in 30 hours of contact with rumen fluid, uNDF240 is the amount that is undigested in 240 hrs. The concept is that after 10 days in rumen fluid the remaining fiber will not digest further. This Continue Reading
Little by Little
Little by little, the dairy industry is being compelled to move in other directions due to many market forces. With inflation and its effects on the cost of everything, plus the comparatively small ramp up in milk prices, the squeeze is on. Forage Innovations has been an outside-the-box thinker and leader on almost all aspects of surviving in this brave new world of animal Continue Reading