BYJOYCE BUPP
Staff Correspondent
BAIR Now that we have it,
where should we go with it?
In a nutshell, that’s the question
John Shenk, Penn State ag
researcher, posed to forage
producers after demonstrating a
promising management tool at the
February 3 York forage seminar.
That tool is the mobile infrared
spectro computer, a complete and
compact feed analysis lab installed
in a van Equipped with computer
terminal, infrared hght scanner, a
weighing system and microwave
oven for drying wet materials, the
unit can read and print out an
analysis of feed materials in less
than two minutes.
Development of the forage
analysis computer took five years
to study and experimentation and
cost a half-million dollars. Shenk
estimates it would take $75,000 to
put a comparably-equipped van
operator on the road full time,
serving a group of farmers who
would subscribe to the Analysis
service on a regular, perhaps
monthly, basis
“The average dairyman could
increase profits $6O to $BO per cow
with ready access to this
machine,” figures Shenk. A $2O to
$3O charge per cow per year would
seem a reasonable amount for the
service.
Calculating a step further, Shenk
says it would take a sign-up
representing 2500 cows to make the
van operation a profitable venture
With average family-size herds of
57 cows, one van would have to do
feed analyses for only 44 herds to
operate in the black.
VORIS SEED CORN is EARNING it s
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Study The Chart Below For A Number Suitable To Your
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VORIS GROWTH HARVEST
SEED CORN CHARACTERISTICS STRESS TOLERANCE CHARACTERISTICS
Best “ Price
Days To Pop Plant Stalk No Drouth Leal Dry Test Per
Variety Maturity (000) Heiehl Quality Till Diseases Down Weitht Unit
V 2381 98 20-24 T 1 1 1 2 1 3 51 50
V 2491 110 21-24 M 2 2 2 1 3 2 51 50
V 2532 112 20 22 T 3 1 1 3 1 3 51 50
*V25$l 114 20 22 T 3 1 2 2 1 3 - 51 50
V 2592 117 21 24 S 1 3 3 1 3 1 51 50
*V 2601 118 20 23 M 2 j 1 3 1 3 51 50
V 2642 120 .20 23 S 1 1 2 2 2 3 51 50
• 1 excellent to 5 poor
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nriOT CCCn pn FINEST QUALITY SEEDS SINCE 1925
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New spectro-computer
can save $6O on dairy feed bills
“ThatVall it is, just a farm
management tool," says
John Shenk of the infrared
spectro computer, in
troduced to York forage
growers during the county
hay clinic.
With an estimated half-million
dairy cows in Pennsylvania,
there’s potential to keep numerous
computers blinking away at
silages, hay and gram materials
Shenk admits the feeders
already doing a top-notch ]ob will
not be the operators to benefit the
most from the space-age service
They’re already doing an. ob
viously good job of feed ration
balancing.
Those operations that would
stand to gam the most from a
regular analysis service are the
large-number herds, where feed is
used in large tonnages and forages
can change rapidly in nutrient
value “■
Value of the program depends
solely on the accuracy of the feed
samples For a true picture of the
complete feeding program, all
feeds must be tested, since the
protein, fiber and TDN m silages
must be balanced with that from
grains and hay products.
Among the approximately 80
forage producers who came from
as far away as Maryland for feed
analysis, the computer evoked
interest, praise and little doubt
that the service will become an
accepted part of future feeding
programs
How soon, and just who will offer
the service, remain the only real
questions surrounding the
establishment of regular analysis
routes.
Some growers were delighted
with their computerized forage
report cards, while others scrat
ched their heads over the results.
Frank Wilmot, Summit Hall
Turf Farm in Gaithersburg,
Maryland, came up with a 22
percent protein analysis on a
mostly alfalfa with some bluegrass
hay made in rotation with the
farm’s turf cropping.
“Food’s an energy source and
we can’t afford to be as wasteful
with it as we’ve been in the past,”
Wilmot mused after the meeting
He sees the computer as havmg
tremendous potential toward that
purpose.
“I think it’s neat'” was
* Lancaster Farming, Saturday, February 14,1911—C31
Forage growers clustered around Penn State ag researcher
John Shenk and his infrared spectro computer as the mobile
lab sampled and analyzed various forage products.
reaction of Faith Peterson, who’d
brought a sample of the forage for
the family’s cow-calf operation at
New Oxford.
And another dairyman planned
to go home and push a pencil, after
the computer told him to stop
feeding the high-moisture corn
stored m his silos and start adding
40 percent supplement to his dairy
ration, for recommended levels of
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protein.
The researchers are now
drawing up guidelines for a pilot
program to take the van on the
road to the feedlots of the state’s
dairy and livestock operators.
Funding of the continued program
seems to be the only real roadblock
that remains to infrared spectre
computer’s revolutionizing farm
feeding.