The Moos Room™

[music] [cow mooing]
Joe: Welcome to Moos Room, everybody. This is one of your hosts, Dr. Joe Armstrong. This week we have a guest with us, Dr. Bradley J. Hines's grad student, Glenda Pereira. She is from someplace very interesting and I was very fascinated with it. Because I had too many questions, we had to break this into two episodes. The first episode is really going to be just about the Azores and where Glenda is from where her dad is still dairying.
I hope you enjoy learning about this other system and this different country. Enjoy the episode. Thank you, Glenda, for coming on. We'll follow up with Glenda next week when we continue, and we'll actually talk about her research that she's doing with Brad up at the University of Minnesota Dairy at the West Central Research and Outreach Center.
Welcome to The Moos Room, everybody. We are here with a special guest as you heard in the intro. Glenda Pereira is here with us and she's going to be talking about, first of all, where she came from and where her dad still lives in dairies, which I think is very interesting and it's been described to me as the Hawaii of Europe if that sounds about right. Brad and Emily are both here. I'm sure you'll hear them chime in at some point.
Emily: Oh, for sure.
Bradley: Remember, Glenda is my PhD grad student.
Glenda: Yes, please say that.
Bradley: That's who she is and that's why she is here today.
Joe: We have to make sure.
Glenda: Technically.
Emily: More importantly, Glenda is my friend.
Glenda: Yes.
Joe: Bradley, it's important to note that Dr. Bradley J. Hines is so important that he has more than one grad student. It's very important to put that out there.
Glenda: He's my mentor and he's been my mentor for now six years, so that's a long time.
Joe: That's a long time, and I'm sorry.
Emily: It only gets worse as somebody who's dealt with him for too many years.
Joe: I'm only a year in, so it's tough.
Bradley: She started as my intern in 2014. We won't start there. We'll start [unintelligible 00:02:18]
Joe: Let's go further back. Glenda, tell everybody where you're from.
Glenda: I am from a place called the Azores specifically from an island called S�o Miguel. The Azores are a location in the middle of the Atlantic. They are volcanic, and there's nine islands. The biggest industry in all of those islands for the most part is agriculture. We have a lot of dairy cows which is surprising because it's such a small place. On the island where I'm from which is called S�o Miguel, we have about 50,000 milking cows, and then in total, the rest of the island including S�o Miguel, we have about 90,000 milking cows.
Joe: That's a lot. I don't feel like that's a very big place to have that many cows.
Emily: Yes, for that land base.
Glenda: It's not, and it's very surprising how we make it work.
Joe: It's probably the perfect environment to grow grass at least from the pictures I've seen.
Glenda: It is, absolutely. Our cows similar to Ireland are on grass for 365, 24/7, so we can take advantage of that. The challenge is how we do that and also have corn silage because we do have quite a bit. We do seed supplement. We supplement the cows on grass. We feed them, of course, corn silage or haylage. Farmers are very strategic in how they grow all of their forage and feed for the cows because it is very expensive to import anything.
Joe: From the pictures I've seen, the Azores are very rolling hills volcanic, right?
Glenda: Yes.
Joe: Where do you grow corn?
Glenda: It's challenging. The way we do it is we plant just the same as you guys do and we try to plant it in a place where you can't get a combine. That's the biggest thing. I've seen a lot of rolled-over tractors which is very scary. There's places where we've done it, and then we're like, "No way, we can't do this another season." You just try to find and accommodate the best. That's not only for corn but for bale.
When you bale, which we do there because we don't have a lot of centers for hay storage, so you bale everything with plastic. There's been a lot of people who have gotten in trouble because the bale will roll off into the road where main cars drives because there's just one main road. It's not like this rural super non-civilized place, but there's just one road. The bales, when you bale it and it's on a really steep hill, you have to move the bale to a place where it's on its side and it can't roll.
Joe: That seems pretty labor-intensive in some [unintelligible 00:05:21]
Glenda: Yes.
Joe: With that, that probably contributes to herd size because how many cows do most people have?
Glenda: Yes. On average, farmers have 30 to 40 cows with 30 being most common. There are a couple of people who have managed to have a bigger herd, so 100 to 200 cows. There's one dairy that does have 400 cows, but they're in the middle of the island and they have a lot of management to do that. They do confine some just because of the herd size. Not everybody can do that.
Joe: What about milk? Do you have someone who comes and picks it up like we would see here in the US, or are you having to take it to the processor yourself because the volumes can't be massive with only 20 to 30 cows, right?
Glenda: Correct. We, with 100 cows, started refrigerating and having someone come pick up our milk about five years ago, but that's not common. Five years ago was the first time when we started refrigerating our own milk and had someone come pick it up. Five years is 2015. Most people do transport it in. Some people still have horse and buggy system, so they transport it like that.
Bradley: With milk cans, right? Milk cans.
Glenda: With milk cans.
Joe: That's cool to think about that it makes me happy that there's still someplace out there that does that, that way.
Emily: Some good nostalgia.
Joe: Yes, very nostalgic. What kind of products are we making in the Azores that require that much dairy for that small space?
Glenda: We actually export a lot of it and we make a lot of cheese. We package a lot of UHT, Ultra High Treated--
Bradley: High temp.
Glenda: High temp, yes. Ultra high temp, thanks, Brad, milk. A lot of the milk we drink is shelf stable. Most of our production is in cheese. I think it's about 40% of the milk we produce in the Azores is for cheese, and we export a lot of it to the mainland Portugal.
Joe: With it being that high amount of cheese, what breeds are we seeing?
Glenda: The Azorean farmers are very passionate about their genetic progress. We have Holsteins, and while they-
Bradley: Big tall show Holsteins.
Joe: I was expecting you to say Jerseys or anything else.
Glenda: In the pictures that you saw, did you look at any that we're farming or did you look up dairy farming?
Joe: Yes.
Glenda: Most of them you will see are Holsteins. Our main breed is Holstein. That 400-cow dairy I was telling you about is actually a lot more Jersey and crossbreeds, but that is not common. As I was mentioning, the Azorean farmers are very passionate about their genetic progress. They have done a lot of work to import genetics from Canada and use a lot of Semex-sired bulls because we do have a show twice a year. That show is Holstein-specific. You can't show any other breed.
Bradley: You were the grand champion once, your family was, weren't they?
Glenda: Yes. We've been grand champion now four times.
Joe: Four times, geez.
Emily: It's like a really big deal, right?
Glenda: It is a big deal. That's what I was saying, the tradition and how you build the culture. I hate to say this, but if you're not in the circle, you're not included. It can be very hard to try and diversify when you're immersed in that tradition and culture. Some have done so, which is exciting. A lot of the new farmers my age that will now be taking over their parent's farm have dabbled in crossbreeding and other breeds, which I'm very excited about.
Joe: What are your plans? Are you planning to go back and take over the farm, or what are you thinking?
Bradley: What are your plans?
Joe: Brad really wants to know.
Glenda: Brad wants to know, but if I were to go back, Brad now has a destination vacation. He's not upset about it.
Bradley: I just want to take selfies with your dad in the pasture. That's all.
Glenda: My dad is the selfie king.
Emily: Brad loves the selfies.
Joe: He's a selfie king?
Glenda: He's a selfie king, and usually, he's sometimes shirtless, sometimes not. Where we're located, and if anyone wants to look this up later, is 10 minutes from a place called Sete Cidades where it's this two really beautiful lagoons, and based on the microbes that are growing in that lagoon, one's blue and one's green. It's a place where everybody visits, so there's a lot of tourism. There is a possibility for us to build a small education center about agriculture in the Azores, and that would be a perfect stop.
My family maybe wants to invest in something like that. There is help from the government because tourism is a big thing to a place like the Azores. It's similar to Hawaii. They do make a lot of money off of the tourism. That's a big adventure to go on, so there's a lot to think about within the next year because that's when I plan to finish grad school is within the next year, to decide if I do want to do that.
I wouldn't be taking over. I would obviously help, but I would have my own side project, which I would really like because we can sometimes butt heads, my uncle and I. He runs the dairy, my dad certainly helps, but my uncle leads all of the projects and everything on the dairy.
Bradley: There won't be Holsteins there anymore if you go.
Joe: I guess we should probably start asking every guest what their breed is, their breed of cow.
Bradley: It seems like we talk about breed all the time.
Joe: All the time. We just finished up genetics, so maybe that's what it is. What's your favorite breed, Glenda?
Glenda: I have a passion for Normandes, whether they're cross bread or pure bread. I really like them as a breed, and I think they would fit perfectly in a place like the Azores. We make a lot of cheese, they have high fat and protein. They can do well on a low input system, which will be beneficial because I don't want to see the bills of these dairymen that spend so much money on grain for these six-foot-four Holsteins.
They maximize production with the Holsteins, but the green bill is certainly something that I would be scared to see in a place like the Azores when you can maximize production with breeds in a low-input system.
Joe: I think that's why I was so surprised by the Holstein thing because when I think of a grazing animal in a system like that, that I was reading about and you're telling us about, I think of wanting the most efficient animal possible. For the most part, tall, show-style Holsteins do not fit the efficiency model. I don't know. We talked about it before. I like Jerseys, Brad likes Jerseys, Emily is the sole Holstein person, which is fine. We let her be on the podcast, though, but that's okay.
Emily: You know what my true favorite breed is.
Glenda: I don't.
Emily: Dutch Belted.
Joe: Oh, yes, that's right.
Emily: I'm going to milk 40 of them.
Joe: 40 Dutch Belted. That's what she wants, just a bunch of Oreo cows.
Emily: Using cream dairy.
Bradley: Although one interesting fact, I worked in California a long time ago. A lot of the dairymen out there are actually from the Azores. Not as many from Glenda's island, but from some of the other islands in the Azores. It's interesting how a lot of dairymen and dairies in California were families that had moved to the US from the Azores. Neat little fact. Are there many Pereiras out in California? I don't hear that name very often when I'm out there.
Glenda: Yes, and there is one big dairy in California, but they changed the way they spelt their name. They changed it to how it sounds and is pronounced. They spell it P-A-R-R-E-I-R-A, I think, and that's not how you spell Pereira. When everybody butchers your name or calls you Pereira every time, I can see why changing your name might be helpful.
Joe: Right. Is there anything else you want to tell us about the homeland, Glenda?
Glenda: What I really want is for people to go look it up on Google, search a little bit about it, learn a little bit about it. It's a magical place, and there's an island called [unintelligible 00:15:07] and it really felt like a Jurassic island. It was just this crazy place, and there's this moss wall in the middle of the island that holds enough water for days on end, and you just squeeze into it and it just pours water. It's just this crazy place.
Joe: The pictures just seem tropical, mysterious. There's always fog, it looks like, at least.
Glenda: In the winter months, while we don't have snow, there is a bit of fog and humidity, and that's something we have to deal with. When you're going to get cows at 5:00 AM and you can't see the hand in front of you, it makes dairying interesting.
Joe: Oh, I forgot. I forgot about that. It's related. How do you milk cows? Tell us how most people milk cows. I know your family has a parlor now.
Glenda: Oh, yes. It is very common for dairy farmers to own a mobile milking parlor. Basically, you can set it up anywhere, and you just transport it to where your animals are. It can be anywhere from two to nine cows is usually the type of mobile milking parlors that we have. You put grain in so that the cows come in to eat the grain, and then you transport the milk.
If you don't have a parlor or even with a mobile milking parlor, for a long time, we had to transport the milk. There's a little tank in the back of a truck or in a little tractor or even milk cans. People still ride their horse and buggies and transport the milk that way. There's lots of creative ways that we make grazing, milking, farming work.
Joe: That's always just fascinating to me. I never could picture anyone in the US going out and setting up a parlor in the middle of the pasture and just somehow milking cows. That's really, really cool. We should get to the real reason we had you on today, which is to talk about some of your research and the projects that you're doing. With Brad as your advisor, mentor, Dr. Bradley J. Heinz. Sorry, I keep forgetting to say his full name when I talk about him, and he's doing important stuff.
Emily: How dare you.
Joe: I know.
Glenda: I forgot to share one of the most important stories, guys. You'll have to add this back in, I'm sorry.
Brad: That's okay.
Glenda: In 2013, I had met Les Hansen in the Azores at a meeting that the Herd Association there set up. Les was talking about Brad's research from California. Being a few of the people who speak English at this event, I approached Les and was very inquisitive about research and what they were doing here at the University of Minnesota. That is actually how I got in contact with Brad. The Azores is a magical place.
Joe: That's such a weird, small-world coincidence. That's cool. Then you got hold of Brad, you came here, you came in and interned first and went through--
Glenda: Yes, in 2014.
Joe: In 2014. That's all we have for today. Sorry about the sharp cut-off, but we're going to continue with Glenda next week when we talk more about her research and what she's learned about monitoring technology up at the University of Minnesota Dairy at the West Central Research and Outreach Center.
If you have questions for us, ideas, comments about the show, scathing rebuttals, you know what to do. Catch us at themoosroom@umn.edu. That's T-H-E-M-O-O-S-R-O-O-M@umn.edu. Thank you for listening. We'll catch you next episode.
Bradley: Can somebody pause her?
Joe: She's the host. I can't mute her.
Emily: I have all the power. Sorry, I'm done.
[music]
[00:19:32] [END OF AUDIO]

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