NMC Annual Meeting 2023 to address ‘Putting Science Into Practice’
Mark your calendars to attend the 2023 National Mastitis Council (NMC) Annual Meeting, January 30-February 2, in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. The 62nd NMC Annual Meeting will revolve around the theme “Putting Science Into Practice.”
“We (dairy producers, dairy educators and dairy consultants) know we do a lot to put science into practice,” stated Christina Petersson-Wolfe, NMC Annual Meeting program chair and Virginia Tech associate professor – dairy science. “As an industry, we know that putting science into practice improves animal health and profitability. One of our challenges is learning how to communicate this to consumers. Plus, we also want to meet consumers’ demands.”
With the Putting Science Into Practice theme in mind, the four General Sessions will focus on well-being and udder health, milking technologies, milking equipment and use of technologies. In addition, a fifth session will be offered in Spanish. Plus, 10 posters selected from the Technology Transfer Session will be presented orally, by the respective lead authors, during the Research and Development Summaries Session, scheduled for the afternoon of February 1.
Optional farm tour
The NMC Annual Meeting kicks off on January 30, with an optional dairy farm tour. The first stop is Glo-Crest Dairy, which is owned by Scott and Jennifer Glover. The 210-cow dairy is located in the beautiful, rolling hills near Clermont, Georgia – less than an hour north of Atlanta. A fourth-generation dairy farmer, Scott had his first taste of dairying working alongside his grandfather while he was still in school. After working with his Uncle Steve Crumley for several years, Scott ventured into the dairy business for himself in 2000.
“Milk quality is our number one priority at Glo-Crest Dairy,” stated Scott Glover “The practices we have in place to care for our cows has captured our farm the ‘Cream of the Crop’ award each year since 2004!”
The family is dedicated to their cows’ comfort and health – 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Cows spend part of each day grazing the farm’s lush pastures. During Georgia’s hot summers, Glovers’ cows enjoy hanging out by fans in the freestall barn to keep cool.
In July 2011, the Glovers opened Mountain Fresh Creamery – located just south of Gainesville, Georgia – where they bottle non-homogenized and low-temp pasteurized milk from their farm. They offer whole, chocolate and lowfat milk, buttermilk and cream, along with making their own butter and ice cream. Customers can watch milk being bottled while they shop for locally raised products and enjoy hand-dipped ice cream and milkshakes from the silo. As they say, “Mountain Fresh Creamery, where the milk is so fresh that the cow doesn’t even know it’s gone!”
The other tour stops, which still need to be confirmed, feature larger dairy herds that use advanced milking technologies and health monitoring systems.
Small group learning opportunities
Short Courses, with limited registration (about 20 to 30 students per course), start the evening of January 30. Several Short Courses feature The Teaching Parlor – a portable teaching device that provides hands-on learning experiences for those interested in troubleshooting and fine-tuning milking systems to help optimize milk production and milking throughput, and support teat and udder health. Additionally, Short Courses will be offered the morning and afternoon of January 31, and the evening of February 1. Watch the NMC website (www.nmconline.org) for course topics, descriptions and instructors. NMC Annual Meeting registrants may choose up to four courses from a slate of approximately 15 courses.
Graduate students earn expense-paid trip
As the 2023 NMC Scholars, four graduate students – Caitlin Jeffrey, University of Vermont, Mauricio Oliveira, Ohio State University, Alicia Romano, University of Bern, and Helena Reydams, Ghent University – earned an expense-paid trip to attend the NMC Annual Meeting. This program strives to support the development of future udder health, milking management and milk quality specialists.
A 2013 Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine graduate, Jeffrey is currently pursuing a PhD in the University of Vermont’s department of veterinary sciences. She is conducting research to better understand infection dynamics and risk factors for intramammary infections caused by non-aureus staphylococci on 10 organic dairy herds in Vermont. Additionally, she is exploring how different species among non-aureus staphylococci may be of more concern for udder health. Furthermore, Jeffrey is striving to identify if genetic differences within the most commonly found species, Staphylococcus chromogenes, help explain variability in inflammatory response to intramammary infection with this bacterium, using whole-genome sequencing to identify virulence potential.
Oliveira is pursuing a PhD, under the mentorship of Ben Enger, a 2016 NMC Scholar. The primary goal of Oliveira’s doctoral candidate research is to delineate how mastitis in primigravid dairy heifers adversely affects mammary gland growth and development. His project involves challenging mammary glands of different gestational-aged gravid heifers with Staphylococcus aureus to establish a persistent infection and compare these mammary glands to those infused with saline. He collects mammary secretions and mammary tissues. Then, he uses chemical and immunohistochemical staining to assess tissue structure and cellular apoptosis and proliferation. This information will help him understand how gravid heifer mammary glands are hindered by mastitis to identify potential therapeutics and mitigation approaches.
Romano obtained bachelor’s and master’s degrees in veterinary biotechnology sciences from the University of Milan. For two years, she conducted research for the Italian Ministry of Health, focusing on the epidemiology of Staphylococcus aureus methicillin-resistant (MRSA) and Staphylococcus aureus methicillin-susceptible (MSSA) bacteria in dairy herds and dairy products. In 2018, she joined Agroscope, a public Swiss center for agricultural research in Bern, Switzerland, as a PhD candidate. Romano’s key project is “Analysis of the bovine intramammary resistome and of the bacterial transmission within dairy herds.”
A veterinarian, Reydams was born in the United States to Belgian parents. She attended Michigan State University for two years as a pre-veterinary medicine student, with a focus on animal husbandry. Reydams completed her veterinary medicine education and earned a master’s degree in Belgium, and discovered her passion for ruminants. Her first research publication, which focused on the iron uptake of non-aureus staphylococci in the bovine mammary gland, assessed the genetic diversity and iron-uptake capabilities of Staphylococcus hominis isolated from bovine quarter milk, rectal feces and teat apices from iron-binding proteins, such as lactoferrin and ferritin. Differences in iron uptake between species could highlight their relevance as a cause of bovine mastitis.
Text: JoDee Sattler
