I A34-Lancaster Farming, Saturday, Uarch 7, 1998 STATE COLLEGE (Centre Co.) Pennsylvania Dairy Herd Improvement Association (PA DHIA) held its annual meeting on February 19 and 20 at the Nittany Lion Inn in State College, Penn sylvania. Vice President Dale Hoover presided. President Nor man Hershey welcomed the group and called the meeting to order. The attendees enjoyed the Erst day with an educational program. The audience heard from Rick Smith, CEO of Dairylea, Inc., Dr. Linda Baker and Jim Boyer DRPC Manager for PA DHIA. Rick Smith, CEO of Dairylea, Inc. congratulated PA DHIA on another year ending with a strong financial picture. He explained the history and structure of Dairy One and the workings of Project Eagle. Project Eagle is the bulk-buying project implemented. Mr. Smith explained “the project is working well for the large farms participat ing.” Concluding he discussed the current industry picture. He fore sees cooperatives continuing to talk about partnering and some times merging. Dr. Linda Baker took the oppor tunity to discuss the most recent findings from Milk Urea Nitrogen and True Protein testing and re search. She added that the same factors that effect MUN also af fect milk protein. After explaining protein metabolism, she con cluded with her “take home mes sage” that milk crude protein con centrations are not appropriate to Management Award lor Holstein breed from Dave Slusser, left. agement Award for the Jersey breed from PA DHIA Presi dent Norman Hershey (right). Pennsylvania DHIA Tenth Annual Meeting evalulate protein feeding and the proportions of true protein in milk can be used very effectively to evaluate efficiency in diet formu lation and nitrogen utilization. Jim Boyer finished up the after noon’s educational program was. He used the occasion to inform the audience on how to make the Internet work for them. Jim dis cussed the pros and cons of new technologies on. the market and he defined many terms such as ISP (Internet Service Provider). Con cluding. Jim demonstrated the use of PA DHIA’s web page. Mem bers can access their records through the web page as well ac cess information from other indus try sources, to better manage their herds. President’s Report President Norman Hershey opened the business meeting with his report. Hershey reported “the year recently completed was a very successful one with numer ous goals achieved. Prime among them was a loan pay-off which a few short years ago stood at one and one-quarter million dollars. Members’ equity improved . .. with a bottom line profit of well over $180,000.” He warned “we have had two back-to-back very profitable years but we need to re main alert and flexible to stay one step ahead of the competition and meet the changing needs of the farm management business.” He added PA DHIA continues to be a major player in the dairy records business. The fact that 83 percent of the records produced by PA DHIA are usable by USDA for genetic evaluations puts the com pany in a very enviable position. This is the highestsd percentage of usable records of any of the Dairy Records Processing Centers in the U.S. With this and other qualities in mind, the decision was made to remain “the full service, inde pendent DHIA in the Eastern United States with our own DRPC.” Ending, he thanked PA DHIA’s staff for their hard work in the past year, saying “in order to meet the challenges of tomorrow, we need to remember the lessons of the past and then be willing to taW> bold steps today to ensure our con tinuing leadership role in the fu ture.” Awards Banquet Hie Awards Banquet was held to honor those with outstanding management performance and outstanding leadership ability in the industry. The award for the 1997 Lowest SCC Herd went to Art and Barb Rutledge. The top 1997 Herd Management Awards were received as follows; Holstein: Jacob and Sally Tanis of Centre County Guernsey: Rutter Brothers of York County and Lyle and Laur een Wright of Bradford County Jersey: William Yoder of Somerset County Mixed Breeds: John Ben scoter BW of Susquehanna County Goats; Douglas Newbold of Chester County. Also honored, was Ed Brake of Franklin County. Ed was awarded the 1997 Clyde S. Robison Lead ership Award. Financial Report Treasurer Mark Eby reputed a very positive financial picture for the past year. Members’ equity is up and debt is down. This year concluded two consecutive profit able years. This year’s ending profit was $182,670. The associa tion has made a substantial reduc tion in its debts and a strong im provement on the balance sheet during the year. Report On National DHIA National DHIA board member Norman Hershey gave the report concerning National DHIA (NDHIA). He indicated changes will be made in NDHIA. One aspect is the elimination of the NDHIA legal fund and changes are being considered in the way DHIA affiliates will pay dues to the association. Hershey an nounced that NDHIA CEO Phil Dukas will step down after the NDHIA annual meeting. Resolutions The following resolution was introduced by Scott Kriebel and was passed at the annual meeting. Resolution From District 7 Be it resolved that all herds be listed for publication with DCR (data collection rating) regardless of the number of tests within a calendar year, but only herds with •»,n tests or more will be eligible , state sponsored awards. Conclusion of the Meeting The 10th annual meeting con cluded with Jim Boyer demon strating the new Heifer ’9B soft ware package and with George Cudoc explaining the benefits of using Milk Urea Nitrogen. I DHIA Norman Hershey (right) congratulates Ed Brake, for re ceiving the Clyde S. Robison Leadership Award, with Mrs. Rhoda Brake looking on. Art and Barb Rutledge receive the Lowest SCC Herd Award from Dave Slusser (left). u u^Br (right) of Rutter Brothers, accepts the 1997 ohila ~ anafle ! T l® nt Award ,or the Guernsey breed from PA DHIA General Manager Dave Slusser.
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