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Dairy One launches new MUN report
by John Tauzel
This month Dairy One is launching a new Feed Management Diagnostic report. This exciting new offering provides farmers with an overview of the average MUN values for specific subsets of the herd (such as fresh cows) as well as average MUN values by pen. By offering farms a more detailed view of how groups of cows within the herd are performing, the new report allows farms and nutritionists to better see areas that could use review in the farm's feeding program.
Along with providing performance details about sub-sets of the herd, Dairy One's Feed Management Diagnostic report also highlights groups of cows that seem to be outside of the recommended MUN range (8-14 mg/dl). In doing so, farmers are quickly provided new insights into groups of cows that are not performing as well as their average herd mates.
The idea for the new report came after Dairy One's milk lab launched a milk screening initiative in late 2017. In just six months, the lab identified over 1,000 farms that had more than 50% of their cows with MUN values outside of the recommended range. In talking with farmers, it became obvious that many of them were just looking at average bulk tank MUN values. By just looking at the average herd MUN, they were not able to see differences within the herd. The Dairy One team set about to help provide these farms with deeper insights. These efforts resulted in the new Feed Management Diagnostic report.
Farms wishing to receive this report can sign-up with their Dairy Records Service Specialists during the monthly test. There is even the option to have the monthly report emailed directly to the farm nutritionist. The new report is included as part of the normal MUN testing option.
For more information please see July's Dairy One Improver Page:
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We are currently working on the next version of the Forage Submittal Phone App. Feel free to send me an email with ideas and suggestions for updates you'd like us to consider for incorporation, what current functionality you'd like retained, and what aspects make the App difficult or clunky to navigate. We appreciate your input!
Renee is our senior lab technician in Sign-in/Sample Receiving Department and has responsibility for two other employees in the area. Renee leads a team that is the first point of contact with your samples and thus a most valuable component in charge of moving your samples through the lab in an organized manner with an end goal of timely results. Through a coordinated effort lead by Renee, the team prepares all feed, forage, manure, and water samples received by the lab. Samples are signed in, tagged with our internal coding system, dried and ground before being delivered to the lab. Renee's memory is second to none and she is able to remember and process special customer requests with ease. She also does a fabulous job synchronizing the timing of samples through the various lab departments for large research projects. She has been at Dairy One for 18 years and has been a member of in the Sign-in Department since day one!
