This episode introduces you to the 2026 Nexus Innovation Award winners, recently recognized at the Professional Dairy Producers Business Conference.

We're talking about three technologies that caught the judges' attention: a bolus administered at dry-off that cuts milk production 50% to 60% in 24 hours, an eartag that monitors calf activity from birth and alerts you when behavior deviates from normal, and a semiautomated milking technology that handles everything from pre-dip to post-dip.

Congratulations to the 2026 Nexus Innovation Award winners!

Related articles:

AHV for StopLac

Merck Animal Health for SenseHub Dairy Youngstock

GEA Farm Technologies for DairyProX

StopLac by AHV (1:45 to 14:22)

2:55 How does the product work?

5:30 How was this product developed?

7:00 When do you administer this product?

8:00 How are early adopters using this product?

9:30 What are the long-term effects of this product?

11:05 Any side effects from this product?

12:00 What feedback have you heard from early adopters?

SenseHub Dairy Youngstock by Merck Animal Health (14:25 to 30:00)

15:00 When do you administer this product and how does it work?

15:45 Is the algorithm customizable?

17:00 What insights are you seeing from early adopters?

21:00 What sets this product apart from other monitoring?

23:15 What's the life expectancy of the tag and any warranties?

25:00 What value is created for producers in whole-life monitoring?

27:30 What have you learned about how to successfully transition to an activity monitoring system?

DairyProX by GEA Farm Technologies (31:00 to 44:10)

31:10 What is this product and what does it do?

31:55 How does the product work?

34:10 Does this product limit pre- or post-dips a dairy can use?

36:15 What's the consistency a dairy can expect from using this product?

37:30 What's the return on investment for most dairies?

38:45 Does this product only work with GEA equipment?

41:30 Does this product use more water than conventional milking prep?

42:40 What feedback have you heard from early adopters?

Making good silage is an art and utilizing technologies can help us improve the process to deliver consistent feed to our animals.

This episode is sponsored by Novonesis.

Join host Kimmi Devaney and dairyman George Dick from Dicklands Farm and Dicklands Biogas in Chilliwack, British Columbia, for a conversation about building and managing a digester, their genetics strategy and the evolution of their facilities over the last four decades.

Learn more about their digester by visiting their website.

Episode breakdown:

• [~0:40] History of Dicklands Farm and what inspired the family to start dairying again in 1988
• [~1:35] Evolution of facilities from 1988 until now
• [~2:00] How robots have changed their farm
• [~4:50] How data from the robots and other technology is utilized in management decisions
• [~7:00] What they would change if they built new facilities today
• [~8:40] Genetics strategy
• [~12:05] Other genetic traits they are prioritizing
• [~13:50] When and why they added the digester
• [~16:10] The process of building a digester
• [~18:55] Where they get the food waste for the digester
• [~21:15] Receiving frozen products
• [~23:00] The most rewarding part of owning a digester
• [~24:35] Digester tours
• [~26:50] Tour FAQs
• [~28:30] Questions dairy producers should be asking when considering adding a digester to their operation
• [~31:15] Running a digester as a separate business with different employees
• [~32:00] Fertilizer pellet as a byproduct of the digester
• [~35:30] Rapid-fire questions