New Program for Women Beef and Dairy Producers Launches

Dec 01, 2017

By Jenn Bentley, Denise Schwab

Iowa State University Extension and Outreach will offer a new program for female beef and dairy producers held in northeast Iowa starting in January. "Boots in the Barn" is a three-part series for women involved in cattle production. Three workshops will be offered on Jan. 4, 11 and 18. Dairy topics will be discussed from 1-3 p.m. and beef topics from 6:30-8:30 p.m.

“We’ve had great success with programs designed specifically for women,” said Denise Schwab, beef specialist with ISU Extension and Outreach. “Women often prefer to learn in small groups and with hands-on opportunities. They like to ask lots of questions of presenters without feeling intimidated, so programs designed specifically for women are very effective.”

Three counties in Iowa -- Clayton, Delaware, Dubuque -- are home to 25 percent of Iowa’s dairy herds and 5 percent of Iowa’s beef cow herds. Dairy and beef production have a lot in common, such as reproduction and basic ruminant nutrition. However, they have slightly different perspectives, such as nutritional requirements for maximum milk production, feed quality requirements, and grazing options.

“We know dairy producers prefer to meet during the day and beef women prefer evenings,” said Jenn Bentley, dairy specialist with ISU Extension and Outreach, “so we are offering two different programs to best meet each of their needs.”

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Video: Making budget friendly pig feed on a small livestock farm

I am going to show you how we save our farm money by making our own pig feed. It's the same process as making our cattle feed just with a slight adjustment to our grinder/ mixer that makes all the difference. We buy all the feed stuff required to make the total mix feed. Run each through the mixer and at the end of the process we have a product that can be consumed by our pigs.

I am the 2nd generation to live on this property after my parents purchased it in 1978. As a child my father hobby farmed pigs for a couple years and ran a vegetable garden. But we were not a farm by any stretch of the imagination. There were however many family dairy farms surrounding us. So naturally I was hooked with farming since I saw my first tractor. As time went on, I worked for a couple of these farms and that only fueled my love of agriculture. In 2019 I was able to move back home as my parents were ready to downsize and I was ready to try my hand at farming. Stacy and logan share the same love of farming as I do. Stacy growing up on her family's dairy farm and logans exposure of farming/tractors at a very young age. We all share this same passion to grow a quality/healthy product to share with our community. Join us on this journey and see where the farm life takes us.