Dairymom's Thankful Thursday

There's no other month quite like May down on the dairy farm.

All of a sudden, everything  needs to be done at once.

Everything includes not only milking twice a day and caring for 

our cows,heifers and calves but also hay cutting,wheat harvesting

 and corn planting.

Our feeling of being out of control happens every year but

                                        as crazy as it sounds, I still love the month of May.

I'm thankful for the new calves that are being born almost on a daily schedule,

for the smell of the first cutting of hay,

             

and 

for the appearance of the old fashioned flowers that 

brighten the landscape as we work down on the dairy farm.

                                                                                       

Happy May!

Dairy Farmer Olympics

It's a race to the finish when you are raising a crop that will be fed to your dairy cows. 

The cows are counting on us! 

Each phase of crop production

--soil preparation,planting,harvesting-- 

is part of the relay race.

We began the harvest relay of our corn crop yesterday. 

It's being chopped and hauled to the silo so that it can ferment and

 be fed to our dairy cows  as corn silage.

  Sometimes the farmer  loses the race for 

no fault of his own because of  uncontrollable  factors like weather but  

like the Olympians we've been watching this week, 

farmers don't quit till the end of the race.

                                         My dairy farm Olympics experience tells me that we
                                          will have a few slow starts during  the harvest relay
                                                                 but like true Olympians,
                                    we can enjoy the rewards of hard work at the end of the race.
                                         

Urban Farm Girl

After a lifetime of city living in Bentonville, my mother has moved to the farm with us. 

We're providing her with a lot of new experiences in this transition from urban to rural living.

This afternoon, Mother  took her  first ride in the  big tractor  while Cody

 was preparing the field for planting the fall silage crop. 

                                                                                 
                                    Although she has heard us talk about what we do on the farm,
                          there's no substitute for experiencing it first hand from the cab of the tractor!
                                                                     

The smiles say it all...

life is good down on the dairy farm!   

Dairy Farmer Taxi

                           When the phone rings at any time of the day  and the dairy farmer  voice

                                       on the other end says, "What are you doing right now?", 

                                        I'm pretty sure my plans   have just been  altered!

                                  This week those calls have been mostly for moving equipment

                                             and farmers to the field for planting our fall crops.

                               Dairy farmer taxi jobs have  also included  delivery of tools or supplies

                                                   that were forgotten or lost along the way.

                                                                 

My job as the dairy farmer taxi driver has a lot of benefits...

I get to see a lot of beautiful sunsets, have  great conversations on the way home from the field,

 and enjoy the farmer's sense of accomplishment after a long, hard day at work!

The dairy farmer has a great deal too ----the taxi  fee hasn't changed in 30 years!

Do You Live in a GMO World?

Because  biotechnology is part of our everyday world on the farm, I really hadn't given it much thought until I attended two separate educational workshops pertaining to the topic of GMOs, also known as genetically modified organisms. As I began to read more information about the topic--here's the truth--GMOs are part of everyone's world!

Here's a few fast facts:

• More than 70% of packaged products contain at least one GM (genetically modified) food ingredient (corn,soybean, and cotton)
• More than 80% of the leading agriculture crops (corn, soybean and cotton) contain GMOs
• More than 80% of grain crops used for animal feed, such as corn and soybeans are genetically modified

Words that can be used interchangeably for  GMO is genetic modification, biotechnology, biotech seed, or  genetic engineering. It simply means that a change has been made to the DNA of the organism.

I liked this analogy by Dr. Denneal Jamison-McClung (Associate Director-Biotechnology Program,Lecturer in Plant Biology in the College of Biological Sciences, University of California-Davis) says GMOs can be compared to apps on your smart phone. Adding an "app" doesn't change the phone, but it helps your phone do more. In GMOs, the plant is the phone and the app is the gene added to make the plant drought or disease resistant. The gene added to the plant doesn't change anything about the plant, but the app-like GMO helps it do something desirable--in this case, stay healthy and grow stronger.

According to the Genetic Literacy Project there  are 10 reasons we need biotech foods and crops:

• Biotech crops can help address the global food crisis.
• Crop Biotechnology helps small farmers.
• Biotech crops spur global economic growth.
• Farming using GM crops reduces chemical use.
• Biotech crops increase yields.
• Biotech crops help increase income of poorer farmers, reducing poverty and malnutrition.
• Farming with biotech crops is sustainable.
• Foods tweaked by biotechnology are safe to eat.
• Genetically modified foods improve nutrition and health.
• Genetically modified  crops and foods complement conventional and organic farming.

If you have questions about GMOs or biotechnology, you can find answers at GMO Answers.