Don't Forget About Milk House Waste

The milk house waste is an area that is often overlooked when considering phosphorus (P) loss from the farm, but it shouldn't be. Many things contribute to high P levels in milk house waste, including the cleaning detergents that have high P concentrations, manure, residual milk, and feed. An article put out by SERA-17 suggests two solutions to prevent this P from getting into local waterways; install a septic type system or utilize vegetated or non-vegetated filter strips. Septic type systems work much the same as regular septic systems in that solids settle out into a tank and the water flows into a septic field. Non-vegetated filter strips work by bringing P in contact with soil or other material that binds P. Vegetated strips works by slowing the flow of material allowing the vegetation to remove the P from the soil.

Deciding on what system to go with will depend on the soils on the farm, where a filter strip could be located, and of course the cost of each system. If designed and maintained properly filter strips can remove up to 90% of the P from waste water. However, if the filter strip is too small for the amount of milk house waste it can become saturated and will have to be regenerated. The benefit to vegetative filter strips is that the once the vegetation removes the P from the soil it can be harvested and utilized elsewhere, which helps to keep the filter strip from becoming saturated. Septic systems are not problem free either. They can be more expensive to install and fatty solids in the residual milk can clog the septic field so septic tanks need to be pumped regularly to keep them working properly.

Brian Holms, Professor at the University of Wisconsin, recommends that farmers do what they can to reduce water usage in the milk house because the less waste you have to deal with in the first place the better. It is also beneficial from a water utilization standpoint so reduce the amount of water used in the milk house. He also recommends that the milk content of the milk house waste be reduced. There can be up to 5 gallons of milk left in the systems after each milking. Simply rinsing the system with water and collecting the rinse will remove the residual milk, and the collected material could be fed to calves as a supplemental milk source. Removing the milk from the system expands the options of how to deal with waste, and alleviates the clogging of septic systems as mentioned above.

http://www.sera17.ext.vt.edu/SERA_17_Publications.htm

EPA Takes a Stand on the Chesapeake Bay

The EPA, following the new executive order put forth by President Obama, is going to be taking a much stronger stance on cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay by using the full power of the Clean Water Act. EPA is working with the watershed states (Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, Delaware, New York, West Virginia) and the District of Columbia to develop a TMDL (see previous posting for explanation) for the entire Chesapeake Bay watershed, which will be the largest and most complex TMDL developed. To make it a more manageable, the overall bay TMDL will be broken down into 92 smaller TMDLs for individual bay segments. Each segment will be assigned pollution loads, or how much nitrogen, phosphorus, sediment, etc. can be in the waterways, and these loads will be further broken down to how much can come from non-point source (farm and hard-surface runoff) and point-source (sewage treatment plants, and urban stormwater discharge) discharge. Unlike previous bay clean-up efforts, there will be 2-year milestones that must be met or there will be financial consequences to the offending state(s). The goals are to have the TMDL written by December 2010, and have all the practices in place by 2025 that will result in the reduction of nitrogen loads by 174 million pounds and phosphorus by 14 million pounds. Previously, environmental groups have complained that the federal government was not taking the lead in cleaning up of the Chesapeake Bay, but with this new executive order EPA is putting the Chesapeake Bay front and center. It is still not entirely clear how this order will impact agriculture, but, needless to say, ag will need to keep up the good work and go even further to reduce nitrogen, phosphorus, and sediment losses from farms.

http://www.epa.gov/reg3wapd/pdf/pdf_chesbay/BayTMDLFactSheet8_6.pdf

Water Conservation is Not Just a Western State Issue

Although many of us in this area of the country tend not to worry about how much water there is unless there is a drought, which is decidedly not the case this year, water conservation is a big issue nation wide. As the population continues to grow and the water supplies do not water conservation will become an issue for everyone regardless of where they live. Even in Pennsylvania, where water is abundant, if a producer draws more than 10,000 gallons of water a day they must report that use to the state. When you figure that the average cow drinks about 30 gallons of water a day, a hundred cow dairy would use 3,000 gallons per day just in direct water intake, not including wash water and other water uses on the farm. Therefore, the reporting requirement at 10,000 gallons would cover many of the dairy farms in the state.

A recent article about water usage on dairy farms in Dairy Herd Management pointed out that dairies are often accused of high water usage, but in reality water on dairy farms is often recycled and used for 2-3 different purposes before it is used as irrigation on fields or added to manure storage. Due to the high level of water recycling that occurs on many farms and other advancements an article in the Journal of Animal Science estimates that dairy farms today use 35% of the water they used in 1944 to produce the same amount of milk. Like many other issues in agriculture we really need to do a better job of telling our side of the story.

No-till and Carbon Sequestration

No-till farming is when crops are planted in the spring over the residue of the previous years crops with no tilling of the soil. It has been promoted as a way to reduce sediment loss into streams and rivers, and it has been very successful.

However, reducing sediment loss is not the only positive consequence of no-till crop production. Fields under no-till management tend to lose less carbon to the atmosphere compared with fields that are tilled yearly. No-till farming practices also use less fossil fuels and fertilizer compared with traditional tillage.

These carbon sequestration benefits are gaining the attention of law makers as the cap and trade bill moves through congress. The idea behind the cap and trade bill is that if you do something (i.e. no-till farming) that reduces carbon in the atmosphere you earn an offset that can be sold to someone else that either can't, or won't, reduce their own carbon emissions. No-till farming is not the only solution to reduce carbon emissions, but it is one that can benefit both farmers and the environment.

The following is a link to a radio segment that addressed no-till farming.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112496096

Odor and Animal Agriculture

A working dairy operation will always have some level of odor, but that doesn’t mean we can just throw up our hands and ignore the issue. There are a number of solutions available to reduce farm odors. The first step towards reducing on-farm odors is to evaluate the farm for sources of odor. The barn yard, all housing facilities, manure storage, manure handling and field application systems should all be evaluated for their contribution to the total farm odor. Keeping barns and dry lots clean, installing wind blocks around manure storage areas, and injecting or incorporating manure soon after application are some simple and relatively inexpensive strategies that can be used to reduce on-farm odors. Perhaps one of the most overlooked ways to deal with odor on the farm is to improve communications with neighbors and be considerate about spreading manure. From the neighbor’s perspective, just the fact that you consulted them and are aware of their concerns may stave off many complaints. For example, meet with neighbors before spreading manure to make sure they don’t have any big events planned, try to spread on a week day morning when neighbors are less likely to be around, and apply on days when little wind is forecasted. Taking a few simple steps each day to keep barns and barnyards clean and maintaining, or opening, lines of communication with neighbors open can go a long way to preventing odor complaints.

Do You Know Your Watershed?

By definition, a watershed is an area of land that drains water, sediment, and dissolved materials to a common receiving body or outlet. Watersheds are made up of small streams, which drain into larger streams and rivers and then into bodies of water like the Chesapeake Bay. Although surface water makes up a large portion of water that drains a watershed and is what most people think of, there is also ground water that flows to rivers and streams within a watershed. The movement of ground water within the watershed is what feeds the streams and rivers during times of drought. Precipitation that falls on a watershed can enter the streams through surface water runoff or through the ground water. Soils and plants filter groundwater before it reaches a stream removing much of the contamination (sediments and nutrients). Surface runoff is not subjected to this type of filtration. Therefore, precipitation that enters streams via surface water will contain more contaminants and sediment than water that enters streams via ground water. In forested watersheds, almost all the water that falls is used by plants or gets incorporated into ground water with very little surface runoff or evaporation. The streams in forested watersheds are therefore cleaner than streams in deforested watersheds. By installing stream bank fencing and instituting no-till farming practices famers increase vegetation in the watershed, which can increase the proportion of precipitation that is incorporated into ground water and reduce surface water runoff helping to ensure precipitation reaches the streams as free of contaminants (sediment, nitrogen, phosphorus, etc.) as possible. Watersheds may seem like abstract concepts to many, but everyone lives in a watershed and they provide quality water for people and animals.

Cows and Streams Don't Mix

Although it may be tempting to let pastured animals drink out of the stream, this type of practice has the potential to negatively impact animal health and milk production, not to mention the environmental impact of the stream. Cows tend to defecate in streams which can spread disease to other cows in the herd, not to mention, the environmental impact of feces in the streams. All the streams and creeks running through pastures are part of a bigger watershed and what goes into the stream from one property will impact downstream neighbors.

Keeping cows out of the stream all together through installation of high-tensile fencing is the best option from a water quality and a herd health standpoint and can be done relatively easily. If fencing is not an option on your farm, there are options to make the stream less desirable to the cows. Providing waters, feed, and shade in other parts of the pasture away from the stream will draw cows away from the stream. Also, if cows need to cross the stream to get to pastures installing a solid footing stream crossing that also blocks the cows from traveling up the stream will protect the stream and improve footing, which can prevent injury.

A healthy stream can work for us by neutralizing the impact of excess nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) and other chemicals that may run off the land.

Protein Utilization on Pasture

Pastures are a great source of protein, but energy can be limiting. Therefore, supplementing either a grain mix or a total mixed ration (TMR) is usually necessary to improve production on grazing herds and increase the utilization of protein from the pasture. One way to improve nitrogen efficiency from the pasture and decrease MUN is to supplement the pasture with a partial TMR. A study from Penn State supplemented pasture with a partial TMR and saw an 8 lb/day increase in milk production and a 3 mg/dl decrease in MUN compared with pasture supplemented with 19 lb of concentrate. Supplementing with a concentrate is better than not supplementing at all, but concentrates have the potential for slug feeding, which may lead to metabolic problems and reduce consistent capture of pasture protein. Although the pasture may be supplying a large portion of the dry matter, supplementing the pasture is necessary to maximize its full potential. Total mixed ration supplementation of pasture allows for better capture of protein from the pasture the nitrogen utilization will be increased, which can be tracked though MUN values. For all the effort that goes into developing and maintaining high quality pastures lets be sure we are getting all we can out of these efforts.

What is a TMDL?

A TMDL, or total maximum daily load, is the maximum amount (pounds per year) of any pollutant that a particular stream, lake, or other water body can handle without violating state water quality standards. It has been mandated since the 1972 passage of the Clean Water Act that all waterways have a TMDL. The benefit to having a TMDL on a watershed is that it assess the current situation of a watershed in terms of where pollutants are coming from (point source and non-point source), and then defines how much pollutant (nitrogen, phosphorus, sediment, etc.) can come from each sector (agriculture, urban, etc.) of the watershed. This allows goals for specific nutrients to be set for specific sectors in the watershed, which is useful because in order to reach your goals you first have to know what they are. For clarification, “point source” means pollutants that come from a specific location, like a pipe or smoke stack, and “nonpoint source” refers to pollutants that enter from a non-specific location, like agriculture and urban surface runoff. The TMDL limits are determined by the actual water quality and how the water body is used. The Clean Water Act sets the minimum goal for any water body as “fishable” and “swimmable”, which means that the water quality needs to be good enough to support fish populations and is safe for people to be in the water. Computer models that factor in weather conditions and land use in the watershed are used to determine the current pollutant load, and then the watershed in question is compared to a watershed that has similar weather conditions and land use but is not impaired. Based on the pollutant values in the unimpaired watershed the maximum pollutant values for the impaired watershed are set.