Take the next step toward adding value

For 15 years now, MFA has offered its highly successful Health Track program for calf vaccination and nutrition. In August 2014, MFA launched a new program called PowerCalf that incorporates Health Track, and goes beyond it.

“Cattle buyers have shown a preference for calves that have gone through Health Track,” said Mike John, director of Health Track operations for MFA. “PowerCalf is the next step in adding value to your herd. It’s one more tool to help make MFA customers more profitable producers.”

PowerCalf helps MFA communicate best management practices to producers from conception to sale of each animal, John added. “The program helps you meet production goals, record data on your entire herd and benchmark your operation against other producers.”

With MFA PowerCalf tools and expertise, you’ll reap these benefits:

• You can improve conception, calving and weaning rates
• You can provide essential minerals and other nutrients for fetal development, increase the percentage of calves born early, and add post-weaning weight
• PowerCalf helps you develop an optimal nutrition package for cow-calf pairs, weaning and growing calves, and replacement heifers
• MFA agronomists can help you maximize forage production
• PowerCalf helps you track and analyze records for your entire herd, including breeding, pregnancy check, calving, weaning and preconditioning

John is on an advisory committee for the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, and he noted that MFA embraces the Beef Checkoff’s Beef Quality Assurance program. He pointed out how BQA and PowerCalf differ. BQA certifies that a producer has gone through an educational process related to animal health and welfare. PowerCalf focuses on each cow, promoting and documenting each animal’s health and quality through an array of products, a robust database, and expert analysis.

“The most important new component that PowerCalf brings is the ability to build a database on your entire herd,” John said. “Growers send us data such as pregnancy diagnosis and calving and weaning data, and we benchmark this data against other producers to analyze how you can improve.”

While more than a half million calves have gone through Health Track, so far only a few large operations have participated in the new PowerCalf program. Look for PowerCalf to grow among all sizes of producers.

You can learn more about PowerCalf from one of the approximately 200 retail locations affiliated with MFA. These locations can verify vaccine, dewormer, nutrition and other health-related purchases, and provide expertise on why, how and when to administer products. MFA retailers are backed up by a team of specialists who work on Health Track and PowerCalf at MFA’s wholesale level.

Visit http://mfa.ag/2Pk5bA9, or contact your local MFA-affiliated location for more information.