Semex ai24 Newsletter - Summer 2013

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PUT TIME ON YOUR SIDE

CONSULTANTS AND EFFICIENCY ARE KEY AT REUTER DAIRY Jake Kempel, Semex Partner Development Manager

If you were going to build the ideal dairy what would it look like? Four row, sand-bedded freestall barns with one stall per cow for every lactation stage? A large holding area and parlor designed for easy cow flow? A roomy, pre-fresh pen with freshly bedded straw and plenty of bunk space? Fans, fans and more fans? How about cow and heifer facilities so clean you could literally eat off of the floor?

Maximizing pregnancies and cow health are two major areas that Rick and Dan have always focused on. Natural heat detection and monitoring fresh cows was something they were always very successful with, but this became more challenging as their herd grew. They started relying more on synchronization protocols and spending more time with the fresh cows just to stay at the top of their game.

If that’s your dream, then welcome to Reuter Dairy in Peosta, Iowa! There is no doubt that cow care comes first for the father-son team of Rick and Dan Reuter. This family operation has Rick taking care of the feeding and fieldwork, Rick’s wife Elaine caring for the calves, Dan managing the cows and Rick and Dan overseeing the farm and making decisions together.

The idea of rumination monitoring really intrigued the Reuters and prompted them to start looking into the Semex ai24™ system. After discussions with Semex representatives and reviewing the possible return on investment in areas such as labor, hormones, decreasing the severity of fresh cow treatments, as well as increased conception and pregnancy rates, they decided to implement the ai24 system a year ago in April 2012.

Rick grew up on his father Jim’s 150-cow dairy farm south of Dubuque, Iowa. In 1975 Jim purchased the current farm where Rick began milking 80 cows on 260 acres. The herd continued to grow on its own until 1997 when they built a new parlor and freestall barn, allowing them to expand to 240 cows. The Reuters continued gradually growing with minimal risk to today’s 850 cows, 850 heifers and Working with Dan Reuter 12 employees. The Reuters grow all corn for silage on 800 acres, and buy hay and grain mix to complete their ration. They currently average 100 lbs/cow/day with a RHA of 30,676, 3.7% Fat, 3.2% Protein, and a SCC of 68,000. The SCC average for the last eight years has been 75,000. Key to the Reuters’ evolution and profitability are efficiency and consulting, and this father-son team has always looked for ways to invest money in the operation to maximize profits. Dan, who owned and operated his own hoof trimming business for seven years before returning to the farm comments

“The rumination is awesome,” says Dan. “We are spending a lot less time looking at cows because I have this watching them 24/7. We are using less treatment

medications because it (ai24) allows us to make more timely decisions on questionable cows. This lowers the severity of treatments and drops in production. We are even not treating poorer looking fresh cows that we would have treated before because their rumination is fine and they take care of themselves.”

“You can’t teach cow sense,” comments Dan. “You either have it or you don’t, but ai24 helps either way!”

“I really enjoyed meeting a lot of new people and seeing a lot of different operations and opinions in my time away from the farm, but I sure was happy to get back!”

The Reuters have also seen a significant boost in reproduction since installing and have become more efficient in labor and hormone use, as well as pregnancy creation. The faster they get cows pregnant after their 60-day voluntary waiting period, the quicker their fresh cows get off to a good start and the easier it is to keep milk production up. Dan has used the activity information to help maximize conception rates on cows and heifers, with less than 10% of their breedings being Timed-AI.

“There is no room to spend money wastefully in this industry anymore. The cows and investments have to be profitable,” said Dan.

Continued on next page

about learning from others,

Semex ai24™ newsletter summer 2013 pg 1


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