When Richard McConnell and Tina Williams work cattle, it’s almost eerily silent. There’s no shouting or arm-waving, and no one is in a hurry. Cattle just seem to fall into place, moving quietly and willingly to wherever they’re guided. Richard and Tina say that stress-free handing is a matter of und...

BINGHAMTON, NY — Paris Hill native and Madison County Soil and Water Conservation District Technician, Carl Bartlett was recently awarded the 2013 Heroic Action Award by the New York State Conservation District Employees Association. This award honors a District employee who has performed a heroic a...

HAMILTON, NY — The Madison County Soil and Water Conservation District welcomed area farmers, friends and conservation enthusiasts to a complimentary luncheon in celebration of the John Schell Family receiving the coveted 34th annual 2014 Conservation Farm of the Year and a New York State Assembly C...

When Jason and Amy Ladd received a phone call from a young stranger who confessed his friend had stolen from their business, they were floored. The Ladd’s own Lucky Ladd Farms, a petting farm in Eagleville, TN. The alleged robber was their 19 year-old employee who, in the nature of the young and inv...

Dr. Ernest Hovingh describes himself as ‘a James Herriot kind of man.’ Herriot was a veterinarian in the UK’s Yorkshire Dales who wrote a series of bestselling books about his practice nearly 40 years ago. Dairy cows are where Hovingh has spent the past 20 years of his life. “But,” he explains, “I a...

Dr. Christina Cowger, who conducts scab research at the ARS laboratory in North Carolina, says scab is the trickiest and most intractable fungus that affects grains. But organizations are fighting back in the form of initiatives, informational websites and online tools for farmers. “The U.S. Wheat a...

“Are corn leaf blight epidemics the new normal?” asked Cornell University’s Plant Pathologist Dr. Gary Bergstrom. Bergstrom was addressing identification and control of corn diseases at the 2014 CNY CCE Corn Day, held at the Otesaga in Cooperstown. “Looking back over some of the trends of corn disea...

Test your dairy knowledge — do you know the answers to these questions? What is the common name for Pneumonic pasteurellosis? According to the FDA, the official term for the ongoing relationship between a farm manager and veterinarian is called what? How many pounds of milk does it take to make one ...

Renee Smith, small farmer and manager of North Country Pastured, LLC, recently discussed their newly-operational mobile poultry processing unit, as a part of Cornell Cooperative Extension of St. Lawrence County’s poultry panel workshop. The mobile unit is USDA-certified, and operates with a USDA ins...

More and more growers are planting cover crops to improve soil moisture, reduce erosion and maximize profits. Cover crops can include grasses, legumes and forbs planted for seasonal cover. Over time, using cover crops improves yields, organic matter and soil water conservation. This change is most n...

By Sept. 1, the U.S. dairy industry should have an entirely new USDA dairy policy in place. Once the new program rules of the Agricultural Act of 2014 are in place, gone will be decades old milk price support programs, the Dairy Exports Incentive Program and the limited MILC program. Without the wei...

“When we think about why we have so many calf health challenges, it can come down to those first few hours of life,” stated Dairy Specialist Dr. Kimberley Morrill. Morrill joined with Dr. Fernando Soberon in a presentation for the 2014 Calf Health and Nutrition Conference put on by Cornell Cooperati...

by Brad Johnson, Assistant Professor of Animal Science, SUNY Cobleskill The Stork has been working overtime at SUNY Cobleskill, with the delivery of quintuplet meat goat kids on March 12. The litter of kids weighed a total of 27.3 pounds and includes two doe kids, weighing 3.1 and 4.1 pounds, and th...

Cornell Cooperative Extension recently presented a poultry marketing meeting, which addressed whether pastured poultry producers may best be served through some form of cooperative system: for marketing; processing; purchasing inputs; or even frozen product storage space. CCE of St. Lawrence County ...

Anyone involved with food production has likely heard about the proposed Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), the most comprehensive makeover of the nation’s food safety laws. With numerous listening sessions in the books and the comment period for the livestock feed rule drawing to a close, numero...