Top Performers: Prigge Farms LLC

How many times a day do you milk, and what is your current herd average, butterfat and protein? We milk twice per day. Our rolling herd average is 30,214 pounds of milk, 1,313 pounds of butterfat and 992 pounds of protein, with component tests of 4.5% butterfat and 3.3% protein.

Describe your housing and milking facility. Fresh cows and cows that need extra attention are housed in deep-bedded sand stalls in a barn with the dry cows. The rest of the milk cows, which is the majority of the herd, are housed in a freestall barn with waterbeds and bedded with chopped straw. Cows are milked in a double-8 parallel parlor in the old tie stall barn.

Who is part of your farm team, and what are their roles? Our farm team consists of three owners who manage and run the day-to-day operations. There are two full-time and two part-time employees who help cover the milking shifts. There are six other part-time people who help, mostly family members who help with feeding calves and other jobs where needed.

What is your herd health program? Pregnancy checks are done every two weeks by our vet using ultrasound. Typically, we meet every two weeks with our nutritionist to go over animal performance and any adjustments that need to be made on any diets. We discuss any concerns and ideas with both our veterinarian and nutritionist to best position our cattle to perform their best. Vaccination protocol on heifers includes giving Alpha-7/MB-1 and Bovi-Shield Gold FP 5 L5 before breeding, along with a de-wormer. Vaccination protocol on cows includes giving Bovi-Shield Gold FP 5 L5 at 30 days in milk and a Vaxxon SRP Salmonella vaccine and Alpha-7/MB-1 at dry off. Cows also receive a de-wormer twice per year. All cows are dried off using Quartermaster and a teat sealant.

What does your dry cow and transition program consist of? Dry period is 60 days for first lactation and 50 days for all older cows. We have a group of dry cows that is housed on a bedded pack, using either corn stalks or straw. The dry cow ration is made up of corn silage, grass hay and a mineral/protein mix. Cows that calve are put into the fresh cow pen on day one.

What is the composition of your ration, and how has that changed in recent years? Our milk cow diet consists of corn silage, haylage, ground corn and a protein mix. The ration is usually between 58%-60% forage. This has been a very similar diet we have been using for many years, aside from recently removing cottonseed. Over the past couple of years, we have been and currently are experimenting with a cocktail mix consisting of grasses and clovers and how it might fit into our cow diets. There are multiple reasons behind looking into this, with a main focus on improving cow health and soil health.

Tell us about the forages you plant and detail your harvest strategies. We grow all of our own forages and grain corn. Corn silage varieties are picked with a focus on digestibility. Alfalfa is harvested four times, sometimes five times per year, with 28-32 days between cuttings. On alfalfa, our goal is to have a relative feed quality of 150-190. All forages are harvested by a custom chopping crew.

What is your average somatic cell count and how does that affect your production? Average SCC is 120,000. We installed waterbeds one year ago and have seen how much more comfortable the cows are compared to the old mats we used. We have just installed a Lely Discovery Collector, and we hope this will help lower SCC as well as result in fewer cases of mastitis and ultimately lead to healthier cows.

What change has created the biggest improvement in your herd average? The biggest change was putting more focus on putting up higher quality forages and working with our nutritionist to feed for higher levels of production. Although this is what we believe to be the biggest contributing factor to a higher herd average, it still all starts with teamwork and communication between everyone on the farm.

What technology do you use to monitor your herd? We don’t have any technology directly tied to the cows. We use Dairy Herd Improvement Association testing to help make management decisions on cows along with DairyComp for cattle records. We have a robotic feed pusher and, recently, a robotic manure collector. We have looked into different monitoring systems for the cows but haven’t committed to anything at this time.

What is your breeding program, and what role does genetics play in your production level? We start breeding heifers at 13 months. All cows are on a double ovsynch program for their first breeding, with average days in milk at first breeding being 80 days. We breed with sexed dairy semen and beef semen. We started genomic testing heifers in 2020 and use sexed dairy semen on our highest genomic testing heifers and cows and the rest get beef. We focus on health traits and components when picking bulls. We have had fewer health-related issues and have continued seeing higher components in first lactation heifers since we started genomic testing.

List three management strategies that have helped you attain your production and component level. One: communication between everyone involved with the day-to-day chores to outside labor, like the vet and nutritionist. Two: being able to adapt our thinking when facing challenges and having the willingness to embrace change. Three: being open-minded to new ideas, being open to thinking outside-the-box and always having the desire to learn something new.

Tell us about your farm and your plans for the dairy in the next year. We are the second and third generations on our dairy and have been milking cows at our current location since 1972. We raise all of our own heifers and feed out all beef crosses to finish. We grow all of our own crops. We have no major plans for the coming year other than the robotic manure collector which was just recently installed. It all starts and ends with giving all the glory to God and having the opportunity to do what we love in caring for the land and cattle.