The consultant is our main link to the dairyman. While our supervisors only get onto the farm once a month, and are generally limited to milking situations, you as a consultant are the one that use the results to help the dairyman to manage his farm. Please let us know in any way that we can help you do your job.

The Tools:

PCDART

PCDART is our main analysis package. Please visit the PCDART page for an overview of the program, as well as links to obtain it. Any DHIA herds from the DRMS service area can be downloaded into PCDART for analysis. PCDART has both standard and user defined reports to give you the tools to find problems and the solutions for the herds that you work with. Please call us for any help that we can give you in designing reports and any other help that we can give you in using this powerful tool PCDART Graphing provides three graphing tools to help you use standard herd graphs or scatter plots or create your own to visually view and print the history of the herd.

Pocket Dairy

Why depend on the memory of the farmer when you can have the herd information on your Palm os handheld? Although limited to one herd per Palm per synch in the current version, it gives us an idea of the future of consulting.

CTAP

Current Test day Analysis Program CTAP condenses herd production data from DHIA tests into an easy-to-read format that helps you focus on the management areas you want to examine. Dairy consultants and veterinarians use CTAP for comprehensive analysis of individual client herds as well as multi-herd analysis. CTAP accesses data from all U.S. dairy record processing centers. Two herds can be compared side by side in the summaries section or select multiple herds and create an average to use. You can even graph herd averages for up to six herds in one graph. CTAP can be used FREE for 60 days to give you a hands-on trial period. The download will require you to register with the DRMS office in Ames so you can download client herd data into the program.

Dairy Metrics

DairyMetrics is a benchmarking tool available from the DRMS website for dairy farm performance evaluation.  You can select information to display about your individual herd in comparison to herds which meet criteria that you select (cohort herds).   Producers, consultants, agricultural extension personnel or DHIA staff can use DairyMetrics to compare an individual herd to cohorts or analyze an entire group of herds. Cohort herds can be selected based on their individual parameters within five classifications (general, production, udder health, reproduction and genetic information). Within these five classifications, there are 76 variables from which to choose. DairyMetrics will display information about your herd plus the means, standard deviations, minimums and maximums for the cohort herds.  It also gives the percentiles for each herd performance parameter in comparison to the cohort group.  You have the option of graphing your herd and its cohorts for the previous three months and from data one year ago. The underlying database includes herd summary information from almost 14,000 herds that are routinely processed by DRMS.  The database is updated nightly to maintain current herd information.

Paper Reports

If you are not on our mailing list, contact us to receive our mailings of Benchmarks, newsletters, and invitations to training meetings. You can also request that herd summaries are sent to you when a herd is processed. Benchmarks can also be accessed on our website via the benchmark link in the main navigation area.

Support

Please do not hesitate to contact us for any questions that you have, whether with technical questions, or questions on interpreting the reports. You are welcome to come to any informational meetings, including those aimed at the dairyman. We would also be glad to come to the farm and work along side of you to help you get the information out of PCDART and/or the paper reports. We would be glad to arrange informational and training meeting for you and your organization.