Differentiated Dairy Grazing Intensity in the Northeast

Abstract

As the dairy industry in the Northeast experienced difficult economic conditions in the 1990s, grazing was increasingly viewed as an option for feeding dairy cattle. This analysis used a large sample of dairy farms randomly drawn from three states (Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Virginia) in early 1997 to compare important aspects of the farming operations for four distinct grazing systems: continuous, traditional, moderately intensive, and intensive. Farmers who used intensive grazing tended to be younger, have more cows per acre, and have greater satisfaction with their farming operations. Logit regression results showed that more formal education and a higher debt-to-asset ratio increased the likelihood that a farmer would increase reliance on grazing in the future.