Are Your Forages the Best They Can Be?

After your forages are harvested is a good time for you and your BioAg consultant to evaluate your forage program and your crop ration.
Evaluate Your Forage
It takes some time to evaluate what you have for forages and to what groups of animals they would best be fed. Some dairy producers have had the experience of feeding more alternative annual forage varieties due to the improved crop rotation and soil health. These dairy producers have been pleasantly surprised by the digestibility of their crops if …

Feed Inventory: Do You Have Enough?

Estimate Your Feed Inventory
Late summer is a very good time to evaluate your feed inventory – what do you have and what will you still need to put in storage to make it through the next year? The weather always presents challenges and variabilities. It’s important to keep in mind that harvesting the same amount of acres of a certain forage year after year might not work. 
Too many times we have received calls saying, “I’m out of certain forage.” Feed inventory is …

CUSTOMER SUCCESS: 15-year customer places BioAg at the top for quality feed

After seeing the success of a neighboring farm using the Midwestern BioAg program, Minnesota-based farmer, Darrell Luhman, decided to try the BioAg Way.
Reluctant at first, he split-tested his hay – applying BioAg product on only half of his hay field. He baled the hay off and was soon visited by his BioAg consultant who requested an experiment. Together, Luhman and his consultant, threw down two bales of hay, one from each side of the field.

Alfalfa Stands | Bailey’s Bit About Nutrition

Spring Alfalfa Stand
Spring is here and if you look out into the fields, you will start to see some green popping up. Now is time to assess the alfalfa stand condition. First, you will need a square to measure a square foot; as in the picture below.
Just plop this down in a couple of random spots throughout the field and start counting. One way to count the alfalfa stand condition is to count the individual plant.

Improving Dairy Profitability

To make improvements to dairy farm margins in challenging times, dairies should look “lower” to increase profitability — all the way down to the ground, according to Midwestern BioAg’s nutritionist.
“If you grow your own forages,” says the BioAg nutritionist, “we can help you improve profitability by building a fertility plan to grow a better quality, higher-yielding crop. There’s a lot of revenue potential in the soil, and we can help you unlock it.”
By taking a systems approach to dairy farm management, Midwestern BioAg consultants …

Measuring Forage Quality

Forage test components and benchmarks have changed considerably over the years. In this Q&A, we sat down with Midwestern BioAg’s Director of Nutrition Dave Meidl to gain a deeper understanding of forage test components and how test results can be used to inform management decisions on dairy farms.
Q: How can I use trace mineral data from my forage test to improve results on my farm?
Plants have the unique ability to transform inorganic minerals from the soil or fertilizer into organic, highly available …

Evaluating Stand Health: A Closer Look at Winter Injury

A hardy perennial crop, alfalfa typically overwinters in the Midwest well. However, a variety of environmental and management factors can have big impacts on a stand’s ability to overwinter successfully. Understanding these factors and how to manage them can help increase stand life and yield potential.
What is Winter Injury?
Winter injury can occur for a variety of reasons, but lack of snow cover and unusual freeze-thaw cycles are two of the most common causes. “Alfalfa plants can typically tolerate three weeks of winter injury before …

Research Shows Bio-Cal® Improves Yields by 10.7%

Findings from an alfalfa fertility study show Midwestern BioAg’s Bio-Cal® can increase forage yields by 10.7 percent when used in combination with a conventional alfalfa fertility program. The study is conducted in partnership with the independent Great Lakes Agricultural Research Service in Delavan, Wisconsin, and will run for an additional two years to track long-term yield performance and soil health benefits.
“Bio-Cal is time tested and field proven,” said Iowa-based Midwestern BioAg sales consultant Firman Hershberger.

Growing Farm Margins with High-Quality Forages

Ten years ago, Plaetz Dairy came to Midwestern BioAg looking to improve their conventional dairy farm. Farmers Bruce and Sherry were struggling with feed quality, a problem they hoped Midwestern BioAg’s forage program could help them solve.
“Everything we grow is fed to the cows,” Bruce said. “Before switching to BioAg, we spent a lot of money on feed, protein and minerals trying to keep cows healthy. A big problem was that our cows didn’t like their hay.

Focusing on Efficiency

Needing more hay for his beef cattle, northwestern Illinois beef producer Randy Adolph was ready for a different approach. “I wasn’t happy with what I was currently doing and wanted to try something new,” said Randy.
Four years later, he’s a lot happier with his fields — his alfalfa yields are up to 7 tons from the 5 he was getting back in 2012.
That was when he learned about Bio-Cal® from his cousin, Midwestern BioAg Certified Crop Advisor Ben Adolph.