This article originally written on Precision Nutrition's website and titled "Cattle Feedlot: Behind the Scenes: , and forwarded to us by The Dairy Network is an excellent article about animal care, organic food, and all the issues that seem to be facing farmers and americans today.  I encourage you to read both The Dairy Network article and also the article on Precision Nutrition's website.   The writer as you will read is a vegan, with certifications in nutrition, strength, excercise and more. 

Vegan Visits a Feedyard from The Dairy Network discusses how we as farmers struggle to get our message across about animal care, and the importance of raising livestock.

Cattle Feedlot: Behind the Scenes. by Precision Nutrition and Ryan Andrews is an independent view of Livestock farming. 

Have you ever discussed or made judgements about someone, something or some practice you've never experienced first hand?  Let Ryan Andrew's article challenge you.  If you disagree with Ryan Andrew's or for that matter anything in life, please base it on experience rather than conjecture.

For many the discussion of Big Ag vs Small Ag, is a difficult one.  The question often is based on Big Ag's impact on the environment.  But what is the enviroment,  often it includes  topics such as our natural resources, the hungry of the world and many other topics.   This week Stanford university released a peer reviewed study on "Greenhouse gas mitigation by agricultural intensification."  This study is published in the "Proceedings on the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America."   For many this science based approach is the highest standard of research, and yet heavy to read.  Drover's magazine did an editorial review of the study "Stanford finds big benefits from Big Ag", which we encourage everyone to read if you are unwilling to read the actual study.  But don't take the facts from the editorial, it is a cute and well written article, and the study is based on sound science and research. 

This study might just mark the beginning of a true scientific discussion on Agriculture. 

While not everyone may agree with how food is produced in America, this video has some interesting facts that speak to how farmers feed us.

Saturday, June 12 - 0.5 inches;
Sunday, June 13 - 0.25 inches;
Rain in the forecast all week, will it ever stop?

Side dressed another 330 acres of corn before the rain friday.  We have now side dressed a little over 750 acres of the 1100 planted in late april.  The corn is getting taller and conditions are getting tougher.  Lets hope for another dry week soon, we need to finish side dressing our Aprli planting soon.

2nd cutting Alfalfa looks to be another big one, I guess that is one advantage of all the rain we've been getting.

We love to  try new things, some times we learn a few things and sometimes we are left more confused.  Generally, we try to plant all our corn with a 20 inch row spacing, 30 inch is the industry standard nationwide.  Some recent and more historical studies show a digestibility advantage in corn grown in 20 inch rows, so when we started to gear up to farm our own ground we focused our attention here.

So with all that being said can you see what is going on in this picture? 

Yes, i admit it is a little hard to see.  In preparation for this year we contracted with a local farmer to help us plant corn, in the event we would be faced with a difficult spring.  Since, he run's a more traditional planter (i.e. 30 inch row spacing), we decided it would be fun to plant a field with both 30 inch row forn and 20 inch row corn.  See if you can figure out where this field is.  Hint:  The west side is 20 inch and the east side of the field is spaced 30 inch, and the field runs North and South.  Have fun.