This story also appears in our University of Missouri College of Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources’ Agricultural Research Center Magazine. Stop by your local Research Center to pick up a copy! You can view the magazine online by clicking here: Road to Discovery. In 2014, Pastel, a Holstein heifer, was born at the Foremost Dairy Research Center. The calf was…
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Dairy and Creamery Sees Positive Changes with Pack Barns
More milk production, lower SCC and low-cost fertilizer among benefits
Brothers Dwight and David Fry remember the day that they decided to build bedded pack barns for their dairy cows. They visited neighbor David Gray’s barns on a winter day when sleet was pounding down. “His cows were lying there in the barn chewing their cud and making milk,” said Dwight. “Ours were humped up and cold.” Gray’s experience, coupled…
Evaluating Honors
Dairy Products Evaluation Team takes top spot in milk, 2nd in ice cream
The 2018 Mizzou Dairy Products Evaluation Team competed in the Regional Dairy Products Evaluation contest Saturday, April 7, in Grand Rapids Michigan, hosted by Consolidated Dairy Products and Fairlife. The team placed first in Milk and second in Ice Cream. Individual students also placed, including: Emily Kirisits, first in Milk; Isabel McNeill, third in Milk and Ice Cream; Taylor Harper, first…
Dairy Farmer Uses MU Extension Research to Grow
Mike Meier wants to use same principles for beef herd
Fourth-generation farmer Mike Meier knows change will help his family’s Century Farm survive. The rotational grazing and breeding system he uses for his dairy herd works well — now he wants to apply those principles to beef cattle. “At 56, I wanted to go in a different direction,” he says. Meier wants to see how much profit per acre he…
MU Grazing School Key to Edgewood Dairy and Creamery
June is Dairy Month
Twenty years ago, Charles Fletcher of Edgewood Dairy and Creamery attended a University of Missouri Extension grazing school. It would change the future of the family dairy operation. Fletcher’s father started the dairy farm in 1966. His father milked cows by hand 365 days a year, morning and night. In 1993, the Fletcher family formed a partnership that included poultry…
Missouri Holstein Cow Produces Nearly 24 Gallons of Milk Per Day
Cow takes top honors as Holstein of the Year
Missouri Holstein Dezi is a moo-ver and a milker. The Lawrence County cow outperforms most of her regional counterparts, producing just short of three times as much milk per day, says University of Missouri Extension dairy specialist Reagan Bluel. Dezi, owned by farmer Karl Wilke, churns out 201 pounds of milk per day. That’s the equivalent of about 24 gallons…
Dairy Farmer Carries on Family Tradition
Only one percent of nation’s dairy farms are run by women
The sun is setting on the well-worn path to the dairy barn where Michelle Eilenstine milks cows. She travels the familiar path twice a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. There are 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. milkings. Eilenstine is part of a small group of women dairy farmers in Missouri. They are deeply passionate about what…
A Full-Time Function
Foremost Dairy relies on student workers to help with operations
Work begins at 4 a.m. each day at the Foremost Dairy Research Center in Columbia – and it doesn’t end until 9 p.m. Dairy cows need to be milked twice a day. Foremost Dairy has 210 head of cattle to milk, plus another 250 head of younger calves. That means extra help is always needed. Dairy Farm Manager John Denbigh…
Lucy Honored by Dairy Industry
Award recognizes innovative and original ideas
Matt Lucy wins the Midwest Innovation in Dairy Research Award presented by the American Dairy Science and the American Society of Animal Science.
Big Number, Little Calf
MU's dairy program produces a genetically outstanding animal
A little Missouri calf is recognized as the second highest rated red carrier Holstein calf in the country.