By CINDY LADAGE
Illinois Correspondent

GOLCONDA, Ill. — Besides crop assistance and research, the Dixon Springs Agricultural Center (DSAC) also works with livestock.
Jonathon Volez, who owns a small cow-calf operation said, “I come over here to grazing school. The center is good at sharing with the public.”

Frank Ireland is an animal scientist with Dixon Springs. “The goal at DSAC is to present the research information obtained at the University of Illinois in a manner that the producer can understand how it will benefit their program,” Ireland said.

The University of Illinois has recognized the importance of animal agriculture to the state and region and supports it through research conducted at various sites around the state. The beef cattle research program at the DSAC is the largest beef cattle research program within the University of Illinois system and one of the largest programs at any university in the Midwest.

“The Animal Sciences Department within the College of Agriculture, Consumer and Environmental Sciences has approximately 850 fall-calving cows at the DSAC,” Ireland said. “Every animal, as well as their offspring, is involved with a research project, sometimes more than one project at a time. Our goal is to generate important research results that will directly benefit producers and consumers.”

Part of the research includes studies on cow reproduction and feeding trials. Studies on grazing are conducted using rotational grazing. Cow reproductive research conducted in Animal Sciences at DSAC has included pivotal studies involving the use of an intravaginal progesterone insert called a CIDR.

Studies involving the use of a CIDR were completed at seven sites across the United States with two of those sites being at the University of Illinois. In 2002, the CIDR was approved by FDA for the synchronization of estrus in replacement beef heifers and cows.
This was the first new U.S. cattle reproductive product approved  in more than 25 years and is currently the most widely used method of estrus synchronization. Since approved by FDA, subsequent studies including key ones at the DSAC, have improved the efficacy of the estrus synchronization using the CIDR.

“We are proud of our involvement in getting new products and management practices out to producers,” Ireland said.

He said many of the top researchers in the country now are former students that worked at Dixon Springs. He added that not only is good research conducted at Dixon Springs, but good researchers are created during the process.

“One of our former students at ADM is having an impact on the industry,” Ireland said. “Other graduates are in academic and extension education positions at many of the leading institutions around the country. In addition to having graduate students, we also have undergraduate students involved with projects at DSAC.”
Life experience is one of the things that the Ag center has to offer. “A lot of students graduate and have never seen a calf born,” Ireland said. “During the synchronized breeding, we can have up to 60 calves born a day. “While we assist only a small percentage of the births due to our utilizing management practices like the use of bulls with light-birth-weight EPDs, students are still present to see parturition and gain experience in processing newly born calves.”
Besides research at the center, Ireland speaks at numerous extension programs and instructs producers and students through conducting short courses such as the recent short course on artificial insemination of cows.

This fall, students in the agriculture classes at the Shawnee Community College will, also, have an opportunity to gain hands-on experience by traveling to the DSAC for laboratory sessions involving calving of cows, estrus synchronization and artificial insemination of beef cows.

The public may visit the DSAC, located on Illinois Highway 145 approximately 25 south of Harrisburg, Ill. For further details, call Ireland at 618-695-2442.