On-Farm Training Experience for Agribusiness and Food System Professionals

PDPW APPs Training, June 18-20, 2019 on Three Dairy Farms

– Professional Dairy Producers® (PDPW) host the 2019 Agricultural Professional Partnerships® (APPs) training for agribusiness and food system professionals, June 18-20, 2019 on three Wisconsin dairy farms. The three-day training provides a full-immersion, on-farm experience, to better prepare professionals with limited knowledge in production agriculture and to work with farmers in rural communities with greater understanding.

The APPs training host farms include:

 

 

· Bacon’s Rolling Acres & Gurn-Z Meadows, a robotic dairy and crop farm with a mix of Guernsey and Holstein dairy cows in Columbus, Wis. Owned and operated by husband and wife, Ed and Julie Bacon, the 120-cow dairy highlights two single-box milking robots, a sand-bedded three-row freestall barn, robotic feed pusher.

With a passion for managing cows, the farm demonstrates the latest technologies and advancements in animal health and milking performance management with more than 140 data points to evaluate milk components, repro data, activity, rumination and more.

· Blue Star Dairy Farm, a multi-site dairy and crop farm, operating in Middleton, DeForest and Arlington, Wis., along with 65 team members. Family owned and operated, the Meinholz partners, including Art (Lori) and two nephews Craig (Sherri) and Brian (Rhonda), milk 2,600 Holstein cows and crop 6,000 acres. The Arlington host farm will feature a Germania double-18 herringbone-style milking parlor and subway, free stall barns with sand bedded stalls, feed pad, and a manure pit with sand separation system and management facility.

The farm will offer discussions encompassing multiple business enterprises including, dairying, cropping and manure hauling. The business models will lend as case studies to analyze how farmers get paid, market access volatility, financials, cost of production, economic measures, risk and milk marketing management strategies, asset and capital valuation and beyond.

· Koepke Farms, a 6th-generation dairy and grain farm in Oconomowoc, Wis. Partners John and his wife Kim Koepke, John’s father Jim, and uncles Dave and Al, milk 350 dairy cows, crop 1,100 plus acres, and protect 150 acres of woods and wetlands. Earning many awards, including Dairymen of the Year, the Leopold Conservation Award, and others, the family has a chronicled connection and commitment to their animal care, stewardship of the land, and community leadership throughout rural and urban communities. John and Kim also use the farm’s milk to craft their farmhouse cheese under the private label, LaBelle Cheese™, and is available in markets, specialty stores, restaurants and farmer’s markets.

The farm will highlight animal care practices, water quality, soil heath, GMOs, cropping systems, ration formulation, and overall stewardship and conservation management methods.

Space is limited and pre-registration is required. Transportation to and from the training pick-up site at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, 4401 E. Washington Ave., Madison, Wis., is included in training and required each day, to depart at 9:00 a.m. and return at 5:00 p.m.

 

 

To learn more about the PDPW Agricultural Professional Partnerships (APPs) training and to register, visit www.pdpw.org or contact PDPW at 1-800-947-7379. To see past experiences view on Facebook at www.facebook.com/pg/ProfessionalDairyProducers/photos/.

APPs is an accredited training and offers up to 22.5 Dairy AdvanCE continuing education (CEs) credits for each day. Dairy AdvanCE is the nation’s go-to resource for continuing education in dairy. Find vetted trainings from trusted education providers, track and manage CE credits, and report your CEs through a secure transcript. Subscribe and learn more at DairyAdvance.org or watch the video.

Professional Dairy Producers (PDPW) is the nation’s largest dairy producer-led organization of its kind, focusing on producer professionalism, stakeholder engagement and unified outreach to share ideas, solutions, resources and experiences that help dairy producers succeed.