Dairy farming

Sediment. The sediment test consists of filtering a definite quantity of milk through a white cotton sediment test disk and observing the character and amount of residue. Efficient use of single-service strainers on dairy farms has reduced the use of sediment tests on milk as deflvered to receiving plants. Although the presence of sediment in milk indicates unsanitary production or handling, its absence does not prove that sanitary conditions always existed. 

To handle a peak cooling load with a reduced size of refrigeration plant, typically to make ice over a period of several hours and then use ice water for the cooling of a batch of warm milk on a dairy farm. This is also used at main creameries, to reduce peak electricity loads. The available water is very close to freezing point, which is the ideal temperature for milk cooling. 

Dairy farms have bulk-storage tanks with their own refrigeration plants. These are usually made in the form of a double-skin, insulated tank, having the evaporator coils in the jacket, which also contains water. The refrigeration system runs throughout the 24 hours and... 

Partial LCA for conventional and organic dairy farm systems, from the cradle to the farm gate, has been published for the Netherlands (de Boer, 2003), Sweden (Cederberg and Mattsson, 2000), Germany (Haas et al., 2001), and the United States (Rotz et al., 2010). 

Figure 2.4 compares the GHG emissions in different sectors of the fluid milk process from three LCA analyses performed for U.S. dairy farms. The Cashman et al. (2009) study was conducted using primary data from farmers and processors for organic operations. The Thoma et al. (2010) study utilized... 

A number of additional methods have been proposed to target CH4 emissions such as the use of bacteriophages and bacteriocins (McAllister and Newbold, 2008), defaunation, and reductive acetogenesis (Martin et ah, 2010 McAllister and Newbold, 2008). Additional research is needed as well as animal trials for potential use on dairy farms. 

Beukes, P. C., Gregorini, P., Romera, A. J., Levy, G., and Waghorn, G. C. (2010). Improving production efficiency as a strategy to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions on pastoral dairy farms in New Zealand. Agric. Ecosyst. Environ. 136,358-365. 

Chianese, D. C., Rotz, C. A., and Richard, T. L. (2009a). Whole-farm greenhouse gas emissions A review with application to a Pennsylvania dairy farm. Appl. Eng. Agric. 25, 431-442. 

Ludington, D. and Johnson, E. L. (2003). Dairy Farm Energy Audit Summary Flex Tech Services. New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, Albany, NY. http //www. nyserda.org/publications/dairyfarmenergysummary.pdf. (accessed 24.10.10). 

Olesen, J. E., Weiske, A., Weisbjerg, M. R., Asman, W. A. H., and Djurhuus, J. (2006). Modelling greenhouse gas emissions from European conventional and organic dairy farms. Agric. Ecosyst. Environ. 112, 207-220. 

USDA Economic Research Service (2007). Changes in the size and location of U.S. dairy farms, http //www.ers.usda.gov/publications/err47/err47b.pdf. (accessed 22.10.2010). 

Similar findings on dairy farms in Canada were reported by Stonehouse, et al. (2001). The superior economic performance on organic dairy farms was attributed to lower costs of production for almost all material inputs, including dairy herd replacements and livestock feeds. The organic dairy farmers used more land for feed crop production for the dairy cows in order to be as self-sufficient as possible. The conventional dairy farmers imported crop seeds, synthetic chemical fertilisers and pesticides, feedstuffs and herd replacements, with more of their land being devoted to cash crops. 

Stonehouse, P., Clark, E.A. Ogini, Y.A. (2001) Organic and conventional dairy farm comparisons in Ontario, Canada. Biological Agriculture and Horticulture, 19, 115-125. 

Finally, there is the question of the accuracy of the prediction. It is highly likely that any increase in accuracy will also increase the cost. For a start, the smallest animal likely to be used in grazing is a sheep, which will consume 0.5 t of dry matter per annum. This means that there is little point in trying to predict within less than 0.5 t of dry matter. With an all-dairy farm, accuracy can be less precise, because a dairy cow is likely to eat 4.2 t of dry matter per head per annum. 

Halberg, N. Kristensen, I.S. (1997) Expected Crop Yield Loss when converting to Organic Dairy Farming in Denmark. Biological Agriculture and Horticulture, 14, 25-41. 

Peel, S.J., Matkin, E.A. Huckle, C.A. (1988) Herbage growth and utilized output from grassland on dairy farms in south-west England Case studies of five farms, 1982 and 1983. Grass and Forage Science, 43, 71-78. 

Walsh (1982) concluded, after studying top grassland dairy farms ... 

Table 3.3 Actual stocking rates and potential stocking rates on dairy farms.

Wilkinson (1984) presents information showing that the amount of metabolisable energy utilised on dairy farms can vary by more than a factor of four. He suggests that high levels of efficiency can be achieved by ... 

July to housing. For a dairy farm with half site class 2 fields and half site class 3 fields, yielding 12 t dry matter per ha per annum and utilising this with an efficiency of 67%, annual stocking rate would be 1.9 dairy cows per ha. With a spring to autumn stocking rate ratio of 1.5 1, stocking rate from turnout to mid-July would be 2.28 cows per ha and from mid-July to October would be 1.52 cows per ha. 

Taylor, K. (1982) Systems of Dairy Farming. 1. The Specialist Grass Farm. 

The beneficial effect of available P is further illustrated by two adjacent fields on an organic hill sheep farm in Wales and by two fields on an organic Shropshire dairy farm (Fig. 10.3). Fields A and B on the Welsh hill farm were both clay loams, and field A (with 27.2 mg/kg available P) yielded 13.41 dry matter per ha per annum, whereas field... 

Welsh hill farm Shropshire dairy farm... 

B (with 12.2 mg/kg available P) yielded 9.7 t dry matter. On the Shropshire dairy farm, the fields were both analysed as sandy silts, and field D with the higher level of available P yielded 14.11 dry matter per ha per annum, whereas field C yielded lit dry matter. 

Firstly, we are not quite on a roll. In fact the rate of conversion has slowed to a trickle, partly because the funding keeps running out, partly because there has been a slight improvement in the fortunes of conventional dairy farming, partly because of (probably) short-term surpluses, particularly of milk, and partly because FMD has put a freeze on much forward planning and consultant activity. 

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