Mugisha is an agro-ecologist in the middle of degradation

Mugisha has managed to conserve over 30 varieties of beans on her farm.

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Mugisha showing the award she won from National Agriculture Research Organisation. Photos by Christopher Ahimbisibwe

“You are welcome to my farm,” Joy Mugisha says with a beaming smile. We are in Ngoma-Nungi, Kiziba ward, Kagango division in the new municipality of Sheema in Sheema district.

Mugisha’s house is sorrounded by over 100 acres of well utilised land that contains 20 acres of banana plantation, five acres of coffee trees (both robusta and clonal); 25 acres  of a cattle farm, 10-acre garden of beans and 10 acres of eucalyptus trees.

The 54-year-old Mugisha, an agro-ecologist, who only holds a certificate in agriculture (pest and disease), has made her home an island of conservation and productivity in the middle of the degraded hills of Kagango.

“I use my little knowledge of conservation and environment protection for improved productivity and sustainability”. 

She says that she started farming in 1986 and currently practises mixed farming.

High productivity and sustainability

Because of her research and best practices, she has seen her banana plantation improve in productivity

“When I planted my banana plantation 20 years ago, I used to harvest bunches of bananas weighing four kilogrammes, the yield improved to 10 and now I harvest bunches weighing between 35 to 40 kilogrammes” she says.

She plants over seven varieties of bananas including improved varieties and other local ones.

“I like local varieties because they are easy to manage. That is why I have more of them than improved varieties’.

“I plant trees because I know they are important in the rainfall cycle. I also get poles from the forest to support my climbing beans and also for fencing my farm. I remove all polythene bags in my farms to allow easy movement of water in the soil. These are some of the reasons why I won an award with the National Agriculture Research Organisation for best local practices’.

She says she practices super stem cutting, chopping banana suckers and mulching the plantation to get good and improved yields on her farm.

“In order to have high yields, I rear animals so that they can supply me with cheap and sustainable organic manure for use in my banana plantation and all other crops,” she says, adding that most farmers struggle buying manure and using synthetic manure, which degrades the soil.

Seed conservation

Probably what has made Mugisha stand out is her seed conservation efforts. She has managed to conserve over 30 varieties of beans on her farm.

Mugisha's bean varieties

 “I love to look at the varieties. They are beautiful, nutritious and a rare combination of qualities. I want to preserve them for posterity,” she says.

She has some of the most sought after local bean varieties, which are resistant to climatic conditions such as kasiriira, kanyarwanda, mahega, gantagasize, kishoga, kanyamunyu, kanyobwa, kiribwa ogwejegiire and kankurye-mbarukye.

 Farmer-to-farmer networks

Mugisha has become a centre of attraction for both local and national farmers who come to her farm to learn how she has managed to maintain high productivity, stability and sustainability. She has also formed a women’s association group called Kiziba Women’s Group who have constructed a seed bank for their produce.

Risk management

While soil erosion and sedimentation are wreaking havoc to agricultural yields in Uganda, Mugisha says that she has surrounded her farmland with trees which help against soil erosion and also act as wind-breakers.

She says that the greatest risks on her banana plantation and her coffee plantation is the banana wilt bacteria that affects her bananas. As a researcher she has tried to control such risks by cutting the affected plantations and also using acalacides that can kill the virus and also control the spread.  

She says farmers need to know the seasons so that they can reduce on the banana leaves. "The more leaves on a banana tree the more heavy it becomes  and the more easy it is to be felled by the wind and the reason for putting  plant support on each tree," she says.

Post-harvest handling

For sustainability purposes, Mugisha says that she has been able to use local technology such as a crushing machine, moisture meter to measure the amount of water in the harvested crops and use of a weighing scale to measure the weight of the banana bunches.

After harvesting, she sorts the seeds for easy marketing and conservation.

In the garden, every plant is marked according to the botanical name and class. This has helped her to know the different bean varieties.

Plans

Mugisha says that she wants to start a demonstration farm for farmers to teach people how to practise modern farming.

She wants to install an irrigation system which will help her during the dry season. With an irrigation system, I will be able to have continuous seasons throughout the year.

Invest in agriculture

Mugisha says she earns over sh4m monthly from her. "People should invest in agriculture and food production because it pays well," she says.

By Deusdedit Ruhangariyo

Roundup: FAO chief warns of soaring hunger in Africa

Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) Director-General Jose Graziano da Silva gives a speech during the official World Food Day ceremony in Rome, Italy, Oct. 14, 2016. (Xinhua/Jin Yu)

ENTEBBE, Uganda, Sept.4 (Xinhua) -- The head of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization Jose Graziano da Silva has warned that there is increasing hunger in Africa due to factors including prolonged drought, floods and conflicts.

Graziano da Silva said this on Thursday while concluding a three day visit to Uganda where he held discussions with the government about advancing sustainable agriculture and strengthening collaboration and strategic partnership for a hunger-free country.

He told reporters here, 40 km south of the capital Kampala, that over the last three years hunger has increased in Africa and yet it is decreasing in other parts of the world.

He said the agency would in about two weeks announce new figures of the hunger situation.

Graziano da Silva was speaking after meeting Uganda's Minister of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries, Vincent Bamulangaki Sempijja.

Sempijja said that although Uganda is not yet facing a food crisis, it faced a shock after it was invaded by the Fall Army Worms which destroyed crops, especially maize.

He said the attack came shortly after the country had undergone a prolonged dry spell which reduced production.

Sempijja added that the influx of South Sudan refugees into the country exerted more pressure on the food situation.

"We would be having a lot of food but we now have over 1.5 million refugees. This is a big challenge of top of challenges like drought," he said.

Since fighting broke out in South Sudan in late 2013, more than 1 million refugees have crossed into Uganda. Other refugees are from neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Burundi among others.

FAO earlier this year announced that in Africa, famine had broken out in Nigeria, Somalia and South Sudan.

Last month, FAO and the World Food Programme in a food security report said the rising violence and displacement in the Democratic Republic of Congo was pushing the country to near famine levels.

Integrated Food Security Phase Classification analysis said 7.7 million Congolese face acute hunger - a 30 percent increase over the last year.

Zimbabweans receive food ration from a World Food Programme (WFP) distribution center at rural Mupinga area in Chiredzi, Zimbabwe, Oct. 6, 2015. About 60 million people across Sub-Saharan Africa are at risk of acute hunger as food production situation is set to further worsen with the looming El Nino, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) said on Monday. (Xinhua/Stringer)

To relieve the pressure on Uganda regarding the refugees, FAO said in the last several years it has implemented more than 3 million U.S. dollars' worth of projects to support the refugees in Uganda.

Some of the support includes providing them with locally-adapted and diversified seeds to grow quick-maturing, high-nutrientfoods as well as with kits for livestock treatment, poultry production and micro-irrigation.

During Graziano da Silva's visit to Uganda, he also signed a memorandum of understanding with the agriculture ministry. Key issues in the agreement include ensuring food security, creating jobs for women and youths through agriculture and adapting to climate change.

Africa's largest silent crisis

The influx into Uganda of South Sudanese people fleeing violence – one million since July last year – has become the fastest growing refugee crisis in the world.

It is Africa’s biggest human exodus since the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.

Despite the sheer scale, it is largely a silent crisis not covered by many major media outlets. We must not ignore this emergency.

This week, I am in Uganda to meet some of those who have recently arrived – the majority of whom are women and children – and to reaffirm the support of the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) to the Government of Uganda in its refugee support efforts.

Those efforts are truly exceptional: Refugees are not only being provided with land to build shelter and grow crops but are also granted freedom of movement, the right to work, and access to health care and education.

In addition to South Sudanese, many people and families who have fled conflicts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo are benefitting from this.

It’s a unique approach that goes right to the heart of effective refugee protection, which must involve finding long-lasting solutions that enable people and families to live in safety, reestablish their livelihoods, and reclaim their lives.

FAO believes that agricultural support to build rural livelihoods is key in achieving this goal in Africa. This is why in recent years we have implemented USD 3.6 million-worth of projects to support South Sudanese refugees in Uganda, providing them with locally-adapted and diversified seeds to grow quick-maturing, high-nutrient foods as well as with kits for livestock treatment, poultry production and micro-irrigation.

Other projects have created new income opportunities and helped address home energy issues by teaching people how to convert waste into fuel that can be burned in energy efficient stoves.

And our flagship approach in Uganda – Farmer Field Schools and Junior Farmer Field and Life Schools – have been pivotal in helping integrate refugees into host communities, by allowing them to acquire new agricultural skills and know-how.

FAO is also working with Uganda’s national Resilience Measurement Unit to ensure that the Government can accurately assess refugees’ resilience dynamics, generating “knowledge for action” that can guide funding decisions and help to ensure that support reaches the most vulnerable.

Greater donor support is needed if we are to intensify these efforts to effectively respond to the scale of this crisis.

It is vital that funds be mobilized so that refugees can provide food for themselves sooner rather than relying on food aid, and so that refugees and their host communities can have a real opportunity to lift themselves out of hunger and poverty and build a sustainable future for themselves and their families.
By: JOSÃ GRAZIANO DA SILVA
The  Director-General of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. 
Copyright: Project Syndicate

Here's What Climate Change Looks Like To Uganda's Coffee Farmers

If you’ve ever bought coffee labeled “Uganda” and wondered what life is like in that faraway place where the beans were grown, now’s your chance to see how climate change has affected the lives of Ugandan coffee farmers — through their own eyes.

Rising temperatures and prolonged drought can make coffee trees less productive and increase their exposure to pests and diseases. This is especially a problem in Uganda, where nearly all of the coffee is produced by small farmers who have little access to irrigation or other modern farming conveniences. Coffee is by far the country’s most valuable industry: It accounts for one-fifth of export revenue, and about 1 in 5 Ugandans rely on it for part or all of their income.

Yet climate change could slash the country’s coffee production in half by 2050 —a loss worth $1.2 billion, according to a 2015 economic analysis commissioned by the Ugandan government.

Because Uganda is a relatively small player in the global coffee market, disruptions there won’t necessarily affect the price of your morning joe in the U.S. But within the country, a disturbing new reality is taking root. To find out exactly how Uganda’s coffee farmers view their experience of climate change, I recently equipped a dozen of them with disposable cameras.

None of the farmers had ever used cameras, and the ones I gave them were pretty low-quality. But I was amazed by the more than 300 images that the farmers delivered. Many are candid, well-composed and achieve a level of intimacy that would be hard for an outsider to capture. You can access the full Flickr album here.

The photos show the struggles of everyday life for small family farmers who are facing drought on Mount Elgon, one of Uganda’s oldest and most prestigious coffee-producing regions. We see cows and chickens; children on their way to school; people bustling around water sources; and plenty of manual labor around the farm. That might all sound a bit mundane, until you realize the photos are really a window into the minds of a vulnerable population living on the front lines of climate change.

I set up this project in March with a group of coffee-focused agronomists at the Kampala offices of the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), a nonprofit research organization. We found our 12 volunteers — six married couples spread across low, middle and high elevations of Mount Elgon. We gave each a quick briefing on how to operate the camera, then asked them to document the impacts of climate change. We left those parameters intentionally vague so the farmers would feel free to define “climate change” in their own terms.

A week later, we got the cameras back — and with them, an unfiltered glimpse into how the farmers understood their situation.

Among the intriguing images is a sort of still-life, shot on the farm of Sam Massa and his wife, Robinah Muzaki. They live in a mud-brick house in the mist-shrouded upper slopes of the mountain, surrounded by coffee trees that Massa’s great-grandfather planted more than 100 years ago. The photo shows artifacts from the farm that represent the effects of rising temperatures: leaves affected by fungal disease; a stem-borer beetle, which lays eggs inside coffee trees, causing branches to wither; a clutch of red coffee berries that Massa says “are not properly matured.”

“When you open the inside, there’s nothing,” he says.

Massa’s wife is fond of a picture she took of the family cow. She says that because drought had severely reduced the last coffee harvest, the family was desperately looking for other ways to raise cash. When she took the picture, she and Massa were considering selling the cow. By the time the pictures were developed, the cow was gone. (A calf, also seen in the image, is still on the farm.) So the picture became a memorial to something climate change had taken from the family.

“I had to sell that cow to pay the school fees for the kids,” she says. “If the yield of coffee had been good, I wouldn’t have needed to sell it.”

There were other revelations, things that people might not normally associate with climate change, but that are painfully obvious to those living in its harsh reality. Pictures of nondescript dusty roads show the challenges of transporting produce to market; photos of children in uniforms represent school fees, which is many families’ biggest cash expense — paid for by coffee.

“We are in poverty now,” says Michael Lullonde, whose wife, Lofisa, snapped the picture of a school seen on this page. “To take our children to school, or even get food, is very hard.”

Peter Magona, another of the photographers, says that despite the obvious change in climate, for him and other farmers on the remote Mount Elgon, there’s no other viable livelihood than coffee: “If you look around, you can see the environment has changed considerably. There’s no rain. The yield is very poor, and the income is very poor, due to this prolonged drought. But coffee is our cash crop, and we cannot drop it. We depend on it.”

There are many other stories hidden in the photos, too. Over the coming months, IITA scientist Onno Giller plans to finish interviewing the farmers about the images they took and compile the findings in a peer-reviewed research paper. In the meantime, Massa plans to use the prints of his photos as a teaching tool, to encourage his neighbors to take a second look at their own farms and see what they can do to climate-proof their practices.

by Tim McDonnell

Uganda Gets Shs652 Billion for Rural Agriculture Financing

By Martin Luther Oketch

Kampala — The International Fund for Agriculture Development (IFAD) on Tuesday announced that Uganda had been allocated $168 million (about Shs651.6 billion) for rural transformation through agriculture. The allocation is aimed at enabling rural farmers to access long term loans for agricultural practice.

The fund, which has a duration of seven years, is being administered under the IFAD arrangement called the Project for Financial Inclusion in Rural Areas. In Uganda the project is being implemented by the ministry of Finance and it entered into force in November 2014.

In an interview with Daily Monitor at Speke Resort Munyonyo on Tuesday at the official opening the fourth Regional Conference on Implementation of Rural Agriculture Transformation, with the theme financial inclusion, IFAD regional director of Eastern and Southern Africa Division, Mr Sana F.K. Jatta, said IFAD has 45 ongoing projects in 22 countries in the region with the total portfolio of $1.7 billion.

"Out this amount Uganda has been allocated $168 million, in the category of a medium size country programme," he said.

Ugandan farmers and other business communities are always faced with the problem of limited access to long term finance.

Mr Jatta said Uganda's project is competitive and very innovative which is encouraging because the projects in Uganda have provided productive and beneficial support for the farmers involved in it.

The IFAD project encompasses funds from IFAD itself, government contribution, beneficiaries' contribution, development partners such as the World Bank, among others.

Mr Jatta added if all the funds from the IFAD are added together they total to $3.5 billion, being administered in a cost effective way to spur development.

Uganda's projects include palm oil in Kalangala and the surrounding areas; while in other areas it includes sunflower, simsim and beans.

Mr Jatta said the way the IFAD project is designed based on Public, Private Producers Partnership.

"We started this programme in Uganda in 1995 in Kalangala and it aims at increased productivity of the farmers as well promoting financial inclusion through the government. We do this by reaching the poor with the financial services, train them on how to engage in linkages of markets, train them on business development plans," he spelt out.

IFAD is an international financial institution and specialised agency of the United Nations dedicated to eradicating poverty and hunger in rural areas of developing countries.

Uganda's minister of Agriculture, Mr Vincent Bamulangaki Ssempijja, who opened the conference said: "Increasing household agriculture is one of government strategy of rural transformation."

The state minister of microfinance, Mr Kyeyune Haruna Kasolo, said government's financial inclusion policy aims at enabling the rural farmers to have increased access to funds for agricultural development.

However, the director global engagement, knowledge and strategy division, Mr Ashwani K. Muthoo, told the conference that the funding gap for rural agriculture financing is still huge.

Why are armyworms attacking Africa's crops?

Image copyright

Scientists warn that parts of southern Africa already hit by record droughts now face another potential food crisis because the invasion of a crop-eating pest, known as the "fall armyworm".

Global experts are meeting in the Zimbabwean capital Harare to come up with a plan to combat it.

What is the fall armyworm?

The name is a bit misleading. It is not actually a worm, but a hungry caterpillar that eats crops before turning into a moth.

It is a new pest, not to be confused with the similarly named "African armyworm", which has been present in the region for many years.

Where did it come from?

It is native to the Americas, but experts are not sure how it reached Africa.

One theory is that the eggs or the caterpillars themselves hitched a ride in some imported produce, or even made it on board commercial flights.

Why is it such a threat to farming?

• It is very hungry (and not picky) - This pest targets maize (corn) and other cereal crops, like its African namesake, but it also attacks cotton, soybean, potato and tobacco crops. When it does invade, up to three-quarters of the crop can be destroyed.
• Unknown enemy - Governments, communities and farmers have no previous experience of dealing with the new pest, which may be even harder to deal with than its native equivalent.

Image captionArmyworms can destroy entire fields

• It is fast - According to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), it has taken only eight weeks for the pest to spread to the six southern African countries where there are suspected infestations.
• It travels far and wide - The caterpillar stage does the damage but "it's the adult moth that migrates long distances and that's how it's managed to get round Africa," says Professor Ken Wilson, an expert on armyworms.
• It is not just targeting any old crop - Maize is the primary food staple in many of the areas where the pest has been identified.
• It is hard to find - The fall armyworm burrows right into the stem of maize plants, concealing itself from view and preventing farmers from spotting the problem early.
• Bad timing - It comes after two years of record droughts, which have already affected more than 40 million people in the region, making 15% less food available, according to the UN.

Where is it?

South Africa, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Zambia, Namibia and Mozambique are the chief suspects among southern African countries, according to the FAO.

The presence of fall armyworm in Africa was first reported on the island nation of Sao Tome and Principe in January 2016, it says.

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Chimenya Phiri, Malawian farmer:

"These army worms attack the maize leaves, the flower and even bore into the stalk. And because they dig into the stem of the plant, it is difficult to notice them. It is only on close inspection that you realise almost the entire plant has been destroyed"

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Other research groups have also reported it in parts of West Africa, including Nigeria and Ghana.

But the governments of Zimbabwe and South Africa are the only ones to have publicly confirmed that they have a problem with this specific pest.

How much damage has already been done?

We don't know exactly, because many affected countries have not provided data yet.

Finding out the number of hectares affected and the intensity of the pest is one of the main aims of the emergency summit in Zimbabwe, the UN says.

Image captionSouth Africa, affected by the new pest, is the largest corn producer in the region

South Africa, the region's biggest maize producer, has confirmed the destruction of crops from the pest in six different provinces.

The Zambian government has said that 130,000 hectares (321,236 acres) of land have been affected, with the prime suspect the fall armyworm.

What can be done to stop it?

Insecticides. Chemicals can be used to deal with the pest in its early stages, but after that it becomes much harder, and some populations of fall armyworm have developed resistance, according to experts.

Image captionScientists want a co-ordinated response to the invasion

Other approaches involve digging trenches, employing natural predators, like birds, to eat the worms or even burning the crops, according to David Phiri, the senior FAO official in southern Africa.

Zambia, thought to be one of the first places hit by the outbreak, used army planes to spray affected areas with insecticides, which has enabled some crops to recover, an official at the national disaster agency told the BBC.

What next?

The warning from the FAO is a bleak one, suggesting that things will probably get worse before they get better.

"It has just started - even those countries not currently affected should prepare themselves for possible infestations," Mr Phiri told the BBC.

Image captionBotswana suffered its worst drought in 30 years in 2015

Scientific institutes have also raised the alarm, describing the pest as a major threat to food security and agricultural trade in the region.

However, if there is a "co-ordinated approach" from countries across the region, then that's where the solution might lie, Mr Phiri says.

"We cannot eradicate it, but we can find ways of managing it."

Un affected maize close to harvest

Kenya investigates reports of armyworms in maize fields

armyworm-caterpillars

NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenya has sent a team of scientists and other experts to investigate reports of crop-eating caterpillars known as fall armyworms in maize fields in the western region of Trans-Nzoia, a senior government official said on Wednesday.

Neighbouring Uganda confirmed last month that the pests had attacked crops on farms in about 20 districts in the country, heightening concerns that they could spread into Kenya.

Johnson Irungu, the director of crops at the ministry of agriculture, said the team was sent in two weeks ago after reports the pests had appeared in maize crops being grown by farmers using irrigation.

Kenya is suffering from a drought that has left about 2.7 million people in need of food aid and driven up inflation to a near-five year high.

Irungu said they were working with local authorities to deal with the armyworm attacks.

"We are also requesting farmers to at least control them within their boundaries," he said.

The caterpillar is native to North and South America, though it has already spread to other parts of Africa including Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, South Africa, Namibia, Mozambique and Democratic Republic of Congo.

The United Nations fears it could reach Asia and the Mediterranean in the next few years.

(Reporting by Duncan Miriri. Editing by Jane Merriman)

Uganda’s president supports bill allowing country’s farmers to grow GMO crops

The pressure to pass the Biotechnology and Biosafety Bill 2012 has started building up in recent weeks after some parts of the country experienced food shortages due to the prolonged drought.

Proponents of the bill believe that once it is passed, the already developed varieties of food crops that are drought-resistant will be given to farmers to plant and this would end hunger in Uganda.

HE.President Yoweri Museveni

President Yoweri Museveni says the bill will help the country resolve some of the problems the agriculture sector faces. President Museveni, on March 20 [2017], while touring a demonstration farm at Kawumu State Lodge in Luweero district, is quoted to have said that the bill should be passed to help improve farming practices, backed by modern research and technology.

This month alone, the Uganda National Farmers Federation (UNFFE), researchers from National Crops Resources Research Institute (NaCCRi) in Namulonge and President Museveni called upon Parliament to quickly pass the Biotechnology and Biosafety Bill 2012.

Farmers said the failure by the legislators to pass the bill has denied them the chance to access modern technologies being developed by the National Agricultural Research Organisation (Naro) centres spread across the country.

The GLP aggregated and excerpted this blog/article to reflect the diversity of news, opinion, and analysis. Read full, original post: Pressure to Pass GMO Bill Gains Momentum

Avoid Overmilking: Can damage teat ends and compromise udder health

The traditional practice of milking all cows completely during each milking could be leading to teat damage in your herd.

Overmilking can damage teat ends and compromise udder health—putting cows at greater risk for infection. But a simple test can help you determine if you are over- or undermilking.

The recommendation to milk all cows completely—every time—has been revised due to recent research and field experience. It is impossible to milk a cow completely dry. There will always be some milk in the udder, even after “complete” milk out, because she is constantly making milk.

In the past, it was believed that all milk needed to be removed from the udder to maximize milk yield. However, breeding for high milk yields has provided cows with a high alveolar capacity. Due to this, cows are more efficient as milk producers.

Overmilking starts when the milk flow to the teat cistern is less than the flow out of the teat canal. Fluctuations within the mouthpiece chamber vacuum can occur. If the vacuum in the cistern is higher than beneath the teat, reverse pressure across the teat canal may increase bacterial infection.

Reverse pressure gradients occur only during milking of empty teats, and overmilking will therefore increase the possibility of bacteria entering the teat.

Teat-end health is also greatly affected by overmilking. Hyperkeratosis of the teat, which is a thickening of the skin that lines the teat canal and external orifice, is often experienced in herds with long unit-on times.

Hyperkeratosis doesn’t allow for teats to be thoroughly cleaned and can lead to bacteria being left behind—which also can lead to an increased somatic cell count.

The good news? A simple strip-yield test can evaluate the completeness of milking, and it can be done by anyone on the farm—either by hand or with a unit.

To test by hand, immediately after milking, hand strip each quarter for 15 seconds, collecting the milk in a container. A properly milked cow should have about 1 cup of milk left in the udder. If there is more or less, then a milk-out problem may exist on your farm.

Performing this test with a milking unit requires a little more precision and a milking meter. Reattach the milking unit within 30 seconds of automatic removal and apply downward pressure. Continue applying pressure for 15 seconds before removing the unit. Record the amount of milk that is harvested. Once again, about 1 cup of milk should be left in the udder.

If you discover a problem, many factors could be at fault. Milking machines must be properly maintained, and if automatic detachers are being used, adjust for timely removal of the milking unit. If your farm manually detaches units, employees must be more consistent in removing the unit as soon as “end of milking” is reached for each animal.

Timely unit attachment and proper let down, quiet cow handling and timely unit adjustment, and proper alignment are also critical.

A few simple steps can prevent overmilking and can help decrease your overall herd somatic cell count. By following these guidelines, your herd can reach optimum udder health.