Minnesota DHIA News
A PUBLICATION OF MINNESOTA DHIA   Volume 5,  Issue 2	February 2005

District DHIA Business Meetings Set

The coming National Animal Identification System (NAIS) made simple, discussion of DHIA services and reports, redistricting, the budget and audited financial reports are all on the agenda for the upcoming meetings. DHIA General Manager Bruce Dokkebakken served on the USDA/industry committee that developed the NAIS, and serves on the Bovine Work Group for the national system, as well as the Minnesota Dept of Ag committee to implement NAIS in Minnesota. Bring you questions and concerns.

Lunch is provided at the start of the meeting (11:30 a.m. unless listed differently). The program will last about 2 hours. Each member farm attending is entitled to one vote on the issues.

• Essig at Karl’s on February 21 - Southwest District
• Glenwood at Pizza Ranch downtown on February 22 – West Central District*
• Mahnomen at Shooting Star on February 24 – Northwest District
• Milaca at Embers (169 x 23) on February 28 – Northeast District*
• Lewiston at Paradise Lanes (on 14) on March 1 – Southeast District
• Barron WI on March 3 – Barron Washburn Annual Meeting (11 a.m. start)
• Kasson at Diggers (south of 14) on March 8 – South Central
• Norwood at Kubes on March 9 – Metro
• Sauk Centre at DHIA Lab on March 10 – Central District* (noon start)
• * election of a director and alternate for Minnesota DHIA Board of Directors

January Milk Quality Leaders

National Animal Identification System Update

The goal of this system is to enable a trace back and trace forward of animals in the event that a foreign animal disease shows up at slaughter or in a herd. The tracking system will enable the Animal Health Officials to take prompt action to safeguard the national herd. Introduction of one of these diseases, such as Foot and Mouth Disease or BSE could occur by accident or by terrorist act.

Premise Identification is the basis of the NAIS program. The Minnesota Board of Animal Health and Department of Agriculture have identified most dairy premises already, and have sent premise ID cards to producers. Be sure to keep this card for future use when ordering tags or moving animals.

The next step in the ID system is to identify animals before they leave the premise of origin. There are several research studies underway to determine what ID system will be used. The goal is to use one that creates no undue burden on the producers or others along the supply chain, and is able to operate at the speed of commerce (won’t slow down animal movement through an auction market or slaughter house). Each species has input on what will be most useful for their species. The Bovine working group (beef, dairy, bison) has selected RFID as the most workable technology. It features high tag retention rate (98% in most studies), rapid reading with a variety of readers. It is the technology selected by Australia, Canada (implemented 1/1/2005), the European Economic Community, Brazil, and Mexico.

The program is optional now, as infrastructure is put into place and testing is done. Once things are in place and working well, it is expected that the program will be used everywhere. Once the system is in place, all trace forward and trace backs should be enabled within 48 hours of the detection of a disease. Some markets already pay bonuses for source or age verification.

RFID offers opportunities for enhanced management information and value added as well. There are companies actively marketing RFID tags and information systems. Some of these have potential.

Minnesota DHIA does sell RFID tags. We have the database and data collection system to track and report NAIS data whenever the state and federal databases are ready. We are already supplying this service to customers. Those interested in being early implementers may talk to your field tech on your next test, or call Minnesota DHIA. While there is no hurry to implement this system on your farm, you might check with us before buying tags or systems from someone else that you may not need.

We have been involved in the development of this program nationally as well as in Minnesota. We have tagged and read over 3,000 animals in our DHIA system, and some of our customers are tagging their heifer calves with RFID.

For our Wisconsin customers, we are an agent for WLIC and can get your premise ID number for you. You will need that number by November of this year according to Wisconsin law. At the request of your Ag Commissioner, we also can report the tag numbers you get from us to their database, with your permission.

For complete Minnesota DHIA 2004 Annual Summary information, please visit our website www.mndhia.org

In order to be published in the year-end Annual Summary for Minnesota DHIA, herds must have 11 tests in calendar year 2004, and must have selected the publicity option, and must be above county average. To check, look at the lower left corner of your herd summary report. It will say either "Publication" or "No Record Publication". To change your option, talk to your Field Rep on sample day.

And the Winners Are ……..

National Dairy Quality Award winners were announced in the January 10 issue of Hoard’s Dairyman. The elite top category, "Platinum Winners" honored 7 dairies nationwide including two of our customers, the John Nathe family from Melrose, and Walter, William, and Sue Selke of Dakota.

Two of the 9 Gold Award winners were also from Minnesota. John Rademacher of Melrose and Dan and Jolene Schlangen from Eden Valley were honored in this category.

Robert and Fawn Staub of Mazeppa were honored as Silver Award winners.

Congratulations to these deserving winners, and to all of you who have continued to push the average SCC lower for 19 consecutive months. Our January average was 321,000. That is a decrease of 21,000 from January of 2004.

Much progress has been made in the past several months on reduction of somatic cell counts. However, Minnesota DHIA dairy producers realize the need for more progress. You also recognize that mastitis is not a disease that is likely to be totally eliminated. Many of the bacteria causing mastitis are present in the cow’s environment at all times.

On most dairies the challenge today is to reduce exposure of the teats and teat ends to these bacteria. There are several possible actions to take, but the key points revolve around:

• Keeping the udders and teats clean and dry at all times
• Using proper prep procedures to ensure teats and teat ends are very clean at milking

Pre-dipping with a quality germicidal pre-dip and proper drying of teats remain important aspects of pre-milking hygiene on many operations striving for high quality milk.

You can monitor how well you are doing in preventing new infections using your Minnesota DHIA data:

1. Look at the percent new infections on the herd summary each month.
   Overall, average new infections are about 9-10% of all tests each month.
   Better herds can consistently achieve rates of 5-7%.
2. If you have DairyCOMP305 on the farm, you can do even more detailed examination of your data. Try these commands (there are many other possibilities) :
1. PLOT SCC=200 FOR LACT>0 BY SCC\ZR

2. This shows you the percent infected each month
   Take a look at both the table and the graph

3. PLOT SCC=200 FOR LACT>0 BY SCC\ZRY

4. This shows you several items over several months, including the new infections

5. Add FOR LACT=1 to either the above commands to limit the analysis to only the first calf heifers or FOR LACT>1 to only look at older cows.
3. Ask your field rep about assisting you in submitting a bulk milk sample for mastitis culture analysis.

COWS FOR SALE

35 registered holstein cows for sale…8 Excellent, 18 VG and 7 GP. Various ages and stages of lactation. Will sell as a group or individually priced. Come and take a look. For more information, please call Troy Ostby in Holloway at 320.394.2470 or at 1.800.497.0433.