A Tribute to the Creature that makes my Ice Cream Possible!

It's still June and that means it is still DAIRY MONTH!!! I am going to 'milk' this one as long as I can!!  So, this weeks post is to help educate you a little bit more about where those great dairy products are actually coming from--it was kind of a fun trip down memory lane for me and the very short time that I did Dairy Judging in FFA, but I did learn a lot from it that I hadn't known before!  So, here is some great info, the source is at the bottom of the article if you want to learn more when you are done!!

Dairy cows have been providing nourishment to humanity since ancient times. Evidence of humans using dairy cows has been found in Bronze Age Switzerland, and the ancient Egyptian nobility feasted on dairy products. Dairy cows, along with other cows and some other animals, are referred to as cattle, a word that comes from the old French word chattel, which means property.

Ancient History

Cows, along with sheep and goats, have been milked for thousands of years. The ancient Egyptians enjoyed dairy products, but they were so expensive that only royalty, priests and the extremely wealthy could afford them. The old testament of the Bible mentions man milking cows 44 times. It is believed ancient cows produced much less milk than modern cows, as little as one-tenth of what a modern cow can produce.

Breeds

Each of the six major modern breeds of dairy cow--

 Ayrshire,

 Brown Swiss,

Guernsey,

 Holstein,

Jersey

and Milking Shorthorn

--was developed separately. Guernseys were first raised by monks on the Isle of Guernsey. Jerseys, the smallest breed of dairy cow, were raised on the Isle of Jersey. Ayrshires were raised in Scotland, in the county of Ayr, and Holsteins were nurtured in the Netherlands. Milking Shorthorns were raised in northeastern England. Brown Swiss cows are the oldest breed of milking cow and have been in the Swiss Alps for thousands of years.

Cows in America

The first dairy cows were brought to the New World on Columbus' second voyage, and the first dairy cow was brought to Jamestown in 1611, per the Animal Improvement Programs Laboratory (AIPL). Nearly all early settler families had their own cow. In 1822 the first Ayrshire cows were imported to America, and 1852 marked the arrival of the first Holstein. Brown Swiss were first brought in the 1850s, but by the end of the century they were found all over, even reaching as far as the Pacific Ocean.

Dairy Cows Today

There are around 110,000 dairy farms in the United States, and they contain over 9.2 million cows. Cows spend nearly eight hours a day chewing their cud, which means they regurgitate and then chew the food again. Cows have one stomach, but four separate digestive compartments: the rumen, the reticulum, the omasum and the abomasum. The rumen can hold up to 50 gallons of undigested food, and the reticulum is where foreign objects (like bolts, pieces of fence or anything else that may accidentally fall into the cows food supply) get trapped to keep from injuring the cow.

The Dairy Industry

Milking machines were invented in 1894. Before milking machines, it took a farmer an hour to milk six cows. Now, one farmer can milk up to 100 cows an hour using modern machines. Each of the 9.2 million cows in America drinks a bathtub full of water and eats between forty and ninety pounds of food every day. Wisconsin dairy cows produce between five and seven gallons of milk a day, and each gallon of milk takes about 350 squirts of milk, according to the Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board.



Read more: Fun Dairy Cow Facts

eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/about_6382589_fun-dairy-cow.html#ixzz1O8qlXgVS

JUNE IS HERE!!

I am not even going to ask how it got here so fast or July will be hitting me upside the head before I know it...instead I am just going to try to deal with it and see if I can't get in the occasional post this summer!

So, here's what I have for you today: 

 JUNE IS NATIONAL DAIRY MONTH!!! 

 Ice cream, milk and cheese, OH MY!!  How would I live without dairy--yeah, I'd die.  Okay, so I might be a bit 'cheesey' (ha ha ha) today, but I running on low energy (maybe I need some protein?  Any idea where I could find a good source??)  DAIRY PRODUCTS!! 

Did you know that Milk is the Official beverage of Oklahoma??

● It takes more cows to produce milk annually for Pizza Hut cheese (about 170,000) than there are people living in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

● Cows have an acute sense of smell, and can smell something up to six miles away.

● Vanilla is America's favorite ice cream flavor.

● The average cow produces enough milk each day to fill six one-gallon jugs, about 55 pounds of milk.

● Each person in America eats an average of 46 slices of pizza a year.
● All 50 states in the United States have dairy farms.

● The natural yellow color of butter comes mainly from the bets-carotene found in the grass cows eat.

● The average cow drinks from 30 - 50 gallons of water each day - about a bathtub's worth.

● It takes 12 pounds of whole milk to make one gallon of ice cream.

● A cow can't vomit.
● It is possible to lead a cow upstairs but not downstairs, because a cow's knees can't bend properly to walk back down.
● The greatest amount of milk produced in one year was 59,298 lbs by a Holstein cow named Robthom Sue Paddy.
● Dairy cows can produce 125 lbs of saliva a day.
● A cow chews her cud (regurgitated, partially digested food) for up to 8 hours each day.

● The oldest cow ever recorded was a cow named "Big Bertha", she died 3 months short of her 49th birthday on New Year's Eve, 1993. She also holds the record for lifetime breeding as she produced 39 calves.
● A cow has to be a mom before she will produce milk.
● Contrary to popular belief, cows do not have 4 stomachs; they have 4 digestive compartments in one stomach:
● The rumen holds up to 50 gallons of partially digested food. This is where cud comes from. Good bacteria in the rumen helps digest the cow's food and provides protein for the cow.

● The reticulum is called the hardware stomach because if cows accidentally eat hardware (like a piece of fencing scrap), it will often lodge here causing no further damage.
● The omasum is sort of like a filter.
● The abomasum is like our stomach.

● Cows only have teeth on the bottom


Cool Facts from: http://www.greenmeadowfarms.com/cooldairyfacts.htm
 
 
After researching a little more about June being Dairy month, I found out a few other astounding facts:  June is also National Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Month, and Turkey Lovers Month--so, I might have to add a few posts of fun facts about those great Ag industries this month, too. But for now, let's celebrate Dairy Month by thanking our great American Dairy Producers for all they do to provide us with some of our favorite foods and treats!!!

The Crusade to Save the Wild Horses......& REALITY

So What's up with Ms. Pickens crusade to save the American 'Mustang'  here's an update from:
Eastern NV Landscape Coalition’s latest Newsletter

Volume 10, Issue 2 Page 11

BLM Statement Regarding the Prospectus Submitted by Saving America’s Mustangs Foundation to Build and Establish an Eco-Sanctuary for Wild Horses

• The BLM is committed to improving the management of the Wild Horse and Burro Program by working together with people and organizations that care about these iconic symbols of the West. However, recent inaccurate information from one such organization has been widely distributed, and the BLM would like to set the record straight.

• The BLM has been working with the Saving America’s Mustangs Foundation, founded by Madeleine Pickens, for more than two years in an attempt to place wild horses gathered from Western public rangelands into a private sanctuary. Some of the information distributed in the Foundation’s recent media campaign requires some clarification and context; other information that is being distributed is just plain false.

• The Foundation has stated that the BLM will spend $85 million to remove 10,000 wild horses from public lands this year. This is not true. The BLM’s Fiscal Year 2010 total budget for the program was $65 million, of which $37 million went to caring for animals in short- and long-term holding facilities, $7.7 million went for gathering animals to keep the animals and the range healthy, and $6.8 million went for adopting out wild horses and burros to the public. The requested 2011 budget for the program is $75 million. However, under the existing Continuing Resolution, funding for the BLM’s Wild Horse and Burro program remains at the FY 2010 level.

• BLM managers, staff, and specialists have invested substantial time to accommodate and consider ongoing and evolving ideas from the Foundation. However, despite numerous requests from the BLM, the Foundation has not provided a formal and detailed proposal so that the BLM can properly analyze and determine its feasibility. This would be required from any individual or group proposing ideas involving public funds, public lands, and wild horses and burros.

• The Foundation has indicated that it will be prepared to provide holding services on land in Nevada by next fall and that it would result in a “significant cost savings.” Without a written, detailed proposal, the BLM cannot determine whether this is true. However, Mrs. Pickens in her prospectus has suggested a stipend of $500 (adjusted to inflation) per horse, per year, for the life of each animal. This would exceed the BLM’s existing cost per animal in long-term holding of $475 per year. Her prospectus, as presented, does not demonstrate an obvious cost savings to the American taxpayer.

• The Foundation has asked the BLM to postpone an upcoming Nevada wild horse gather in the Antelope Complex Herd Management Area until its facility is built. In our December 17, 2010, response, we explained that the number of wild horses in this area is significantly above the capacity of the range’s ability to provide adequate forage and water to sustain them. If we postpone the gather until the Saving America’s Mustangs Foundation completes a facility, the BLM may well face having to conduct an emergency gather – more costly and potentially more difficult for the horses, which would likely be weakened by a lack of water and forage.

• The Foundation’s information states that 30,000 wild horses remain on public lands. The BLM’s census numbers put the wild horse and burro population at more than 38,000, according to the agency’s latest official count.

Actions needed to move forward with the Saving America’s Mustangs idea.

• To implement the Foundation’s concept as presented, under existing law and regulations, the BLM would be required to transfer title of wild horses through sale or adoption to Mrs. Pickens and change the class of livestock authorized on several Nevada allotments from cattle to horses. This would require a land-use plan amendment and additional site-specific environmental analysis (under the National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA). All such environmental documents require a period for public review and comment before being finalized.

• Existing law would need to be changed. The BLM does not have the legal authority to reimburse a private party for grazing titled horses (i.e., formerly government-owned horses now privately held) on either public or deeded land; reimburse a private party to graze untitled (that is, still government-owned) wild horses on public lands; or manage wild horses on public lands outside Herd Areas that were legislatively created in 1971.

• To ensure the American taxpayer r eceives fair value, the Saving America’s Mustangs Foundation would need to submit a formal proposal in response to a BLM solicitation that would be open to the public for private-partner preserves. The BLM is developing such a solicitation.

The BLM is concerned that in some of the areas proposed for the Nevada sanctuary, forage and water exist to support a maximum of 970 wild horses, far below the 10,000 the Foundation has indicated it would like to support.

Where Did I Go?

Well, So much for my great dedication to my weekly blogging for YF&R.  So much for a lot of things at this point.  My great state coordinator told me to look up a painting by famous artist Salvadore Dali about melting clocks--She said this is what happens to leaders when they are the only ones doing too much for too long.  I somewhat feel like I am hitting my head against a brick wall--and you know what they say about that, right?  Well, duh, it is the definition of insanity--doing the same thing over and over even though you keep getting the same result!! 
So, to the few of you out there who have read my blog and actually told me that you did and appreciated it, I apologize for my lack of diligence.  It seems that as spring comes, the work for me extends from home and family to yard and garden and more focus on the horses and other animals, to the point that I rarely even sit down at the computer any more, until I am forced to do so because certain things absolutely have to be done.  It is the end of the school year and soon they will all be home all day--wanting to go swimming, wanting the horses saddled, unsaddled, wanting to go somewhere, and ALWAYS needing something else to fix even thought I just fed them ten minutes before. I hope that you are not reading this in a negative way (but, I did kind of set the tone for that, didn't I?) because, really, it means that my life is full of richness and blessings, my time is not wasted on things of no value, even if it sometimes leaves little time for idleness that I might occasionally crave.  It means that I have incredible land to care for when some are crowded in concrete on top of each other and next to each other and never know the semll of rain on alfalfa or sage.  It means that I have animals to care for, calves to feed, chickens to chase and eggs to gather, and most of all that my children are spending time in the saddle and on four-wheelers.  We can laugh and run and yell and we are not bothering anyone else because we have so much room and wide open space to do it in.  So, instead of whining because I can never seem to get it all done, because the weeds are growing faster than I can cut them down, because the garden needs to be started sooner than I am ready, because the pasture fence needs repairing from the race buggies that took it out, I just try to see these things as the blessings they truly are.  And though my children will spend the next three months underfoot, there will be incredible moments that remind me that above all, they are my greatest blessings in the midst of it all. 
Quite often, that means that these many different time-taker-uppers take me away from YF&R, where more of my time is needed because I don't have the support structure that most states have.  It means that I am the ONE working on it.   The ONE trying to keep it going, the ONE that it all comes back down to, and so every-once-in-awhile, I might go MIA for some time in order to recharge my batteries, to build up my energy to keep building the program, with the hope that someday there will be many keeping it alive and I can fade into the supporting structure a bit, too.   So, if you are wondering where I've gone (is that a bit egocentric?  To think that anyone has even noticed that I haven't been YF&R blogging???) just know, that I am still here, that I am still dedicated to the building of NVFB YF&R, just trying to fly under the radar a bit until I can pick up enough speed to keep up with it all again.
Life is good, YF&R is awesome,  sure would love to share the wealth, so let's get going on getting others involved.

Food Shortages in America?

This was a really interesting article that I read today--I have kind fo been wondering about the outlook for ag, the economy, and everyday life as this year passes on and so I have been stopping to read anything that I see related to it and I thought I would share.....what do you think this year holds??


Food Shortages in America?
April 12, 2011
By: Dairy Today Editors
Source: Congressman Devin Nunes


Congressman Devin Nunes (R-CA) and 25 of his House colleagues called on President Barack Obama to release willing farmers from their Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) contracts in order to produce additional grain. With Americans facing rising food prices and government officials predicting the possibility of grain shortages, immediate action is necessary to enhance U.S. production. (see letter here)



“Americans deserve a government that plans for the future. That means responding to threats of grain shortages, not just predicting them. Releasing some land from CRP contract will provide an infusion of additional production that is desperately needed. It’s a decision the President can make and one he should act upon as quickly as possible,” said Rep. Devin Nunes.



Record Production / Falling Stocks


In 2011, grain production in the United States is expected to cover 92 million acres – one of the largest plantings in more than 50 years. Yet despite this enormous production, domestic supplies of grains are falling at the fastest rate ever recorded by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).



Meanwhile, U.S. consumer food prices (for proteins) have risen by 6.8% in the past year, more than triple inflation. The costs of staple commodities are rising at an alarming rate, threatening the weakened U.S. economy but also pushing struggling families beyond their limits.



Real Shortages

Global demand for grains has soared and various national and international agencies are predicting that shortages are likely. As a result, many nations are stockpiling reserves. Throughout Asia and the developing world, governments are working to establish significant reserves. It is time for the U.S. government to recognize the crisis and take action.



Action

Congressman Nunes and his colleagues believe it is essential for the President to act. The USDA can promote increased grain production by releasing willing farmers of arable land from the Conservation Reserve Program. There are 32 million acres currently out of production under CRP contracts. A significant amount of this land could be used to produce crops.

Trying to Close UNR's College of Ag AGAIN!?!?!?

The following is a copy of a Legislative Alert that was sent out through the Farm Bureau and I thought it was important enough to share with those who hadn't seen it yet--

The Details Of The Plans By UNR To Close The College of Agriculture (Again)Our report today takes a slightly different format than past e-notices of this type because the subject is not one we are looking for you to respond to, necessarily. Yesterday, April 4th, we were notified that announcements were being made at the University of Nevada in regard to possible plans for closing the College of Agriculture, Biotechnology and Natural Resources (CABNR), if the Nevada Legislature doesn't provide the funding that is sought for the upcoming biennium. This is the document which explains the specifics of those plans.
Our initial reaction (and not completely dismissed even after a candid conversation with UNR's Provost) was that this approach was being used to persuade rural constituents to make contact with their representatives to support tax increases and funding deemed more appropriate by University officials. We have been assured that while it is necessary, in the political sense, for the Senate Majority Leader to secure rural votes for a tax increase, that isn't the reason that the College of Agriculture is again being targeted for possible elimination. The purpose for doing away with the College of Agriculture, through the proposed merger of programs into the College of Science (moving the Agricultural Experiment Station into that College as well) is simply because of cost savings and preservation of priority areas that UNR Administration believes necessary.
This is the letter sent to all University personnel by UNR President Dr. Milton Glick. It provides a more comprehensive overview of the extent of both planned cuts and possible cuts.
As you may already be aware (and covered briefly in Dr. Glick's letter of impending actions) Nevada Cooperative Extension is currently involved in the review process used to eliminate tenured University employees through the disbanding of program areas. This is the same operational system that CABNR went through in 2010.
The interesting perspective for the planned re-distribution of $5-plus Million from Cooperative Extension to the support of UNR program areas considered more essential, is that the Legislature (when they get to it) will adopt a specific line-item for Cooperative Extension not contained directly in the UNR Budget structure. Both Cooperative Extension and Agricultural Research have their own line items in the state budget and some might suggest are stand alone components. Since employees who are supported by General Fund dollars in Extension are University of Nevada faculty. It appears that the plan is to free up their salary dollars (by no longer having the employee) and then moving those "unencumbered" resources into the operational realm of UNR.
Nevada Farm Bureau has not been a vocal opponent of the move by UNR to acquire Cooperative Extension dollars, primarily because of Extension still being in existence after the plan would be implemented. Granted there would be significant reductions, but each county would retain an Extension Educator and six specialists would be maintained. Although not a perfect world - the potential for continued service (albeit at reduced levels) would be available.
We are aware and wholly support Farm Bureau members/leaders and others who have more vigorously engaged in the defense of Cooperative Extension. We have also reviewed and shared response comments to the proposal by Cooperative Extension to counter the proposal put forward by the UNR Provost. If you wish (and haven't seen this document), you can go to the following website:
http://www.unce.unr.edu/budget/

The website will provide instructions on how you can provide your input online. Input must be received no later than 5:00 p.m. on April 7.
Nevada Farm Bureau's Current Perspective:
It seems likely that there will be upcoming meetings to further discuss the potential closure of the College of Agriculture. In all likelihood, an effort to rally support and oppose the closure will be mounted as it was successfully carried out in 2010.
Nevada Farm Bureau does not currently have plans to support tax increases necessary to provide the funding that University System officials believe necessary.

Given the way in which closing the College of Agriculture is always considered as the first alternative to solving UNR's funding shortages, we have to wonder how sustainable the College of Agriculture might be.
Perhaps, a better and more effective approach would be to spend the energy and attention on obtaining necessary benefits for Nevada agriculture elsewhere. A number of very good agricultural colleges are available in the West to provide opportunities that UNR deems to be less of a priority. Arrangements and support might be possible to assist agricultural students acquire their education in these institutions.
Agricultural research, to address Nevada concerns, may or may not be satisfied through the proposed restructuring of Nevada's Agricultural Research system. Follow-up and follow-through will be required to properly communicate the importance of obtaining relevant research for agricultural needs. Exploration is also underway to determine workable safeguards that secure agricultural research assets for the benefit of Nevada agriculture - as opposed to simply selling them off for the benefit of UNR.
Preliminary information does not provide much guidance on how to approach removing the University of Nevada, Reno's "Land Grant" status and relocating it to an institution more inclined to follow the mission of a Land Grant University. As they continue to maintain their worthiness for such status, UNR officials use an extremely broad view in defining what a Land Grant University might be. They also point to elements of activities being conducted which qualify as still being properly engaged.
As Nevada Farm Bureau (and our state agriculture's community) prepares for future policy activity, we believe it would be extremely useful to consider specific actions that should be taken to achieve identified goals/objectives that extend beyond saving what we thought we had. An emphasis on determining what we need and where best to go in order to have those needs met would seem a more productive approach.
For Your Contact With Doug Busselman:
Office Phone: (775) 674-4000
Cell Phone: (775) 742-6245
Fax: (775) 674-4004
E-mail: dbuss@nvfb.org

So, you think you are having a bad day.....

In case you are having one of those days and you are ready to throw in the towel on your operation, check out these pic's and see if your day compares...

What a Day!