Healthy Calf Conference Speakers

DR. JOHN MEE – One of the world’s more respected experts in the field of calf management, Dr. John Mee, is the keynote speaker at the 2016 Dairy and Veal Healthy Calf Conference hosted by Veal Farmers of Ontario (VFO), your calf care partners. Dr. Mee will share important management tips for newborn calves, highlighting ways that we can tweak our existing protocols to improve calf care.

Dr. Mee is the principal veterinary research scientist at the National Dairy Research Centre in Ireland. With over 30 years’ experience, his research has focused on areas including young calf management, causes of abortion, perinatal and young calf loss, contract rearing biosecurity and dairy cow welfare. Dr. Mee is also a founding member of the Irish National Calf Health Committee and Vice-Chair of the scientific committee for the 2016 World Cattle Disease Congress. He has spoken at conferences and workshops in over 25 countries worldwide and his research has been published in over 100 papers, book chapters and textbooks.

DR. AMY STANTON – Interested in raising dairy-beef? Dr. Amy Stanton from Next Generation Dairy Consulting joins the exceptional line-up of speakers at the 2016 Dairy and Veal Healthy Calf Conference hosted by Veal Farmers of Ontario (VFO), your calf care partners.  Dr. Stanton will discuss important considerations for addressing the unique management challenges for starting calves for the dairy-beef market.  Management during this critical time can set cattle up for a lifetime of productivity or significantly reduce profitability. For example, painful practices like disbudding, dehorning, or castration must be performed using appropriate protocols to ensure health, welfare and rate of gain are not impacted.

Dr. Stanton received her Ph.D from the University of Guelph in Epidemiology and Animal Welfare. Her Ph.D examined the impact of management practices on the health and welfare of dairy calves. Between 2012 and 2015, she split her time as the Animal Well-being Specialist for the University of Wisconsin-Extension and as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Dairy Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Since then she has returned to Ontario, where she acts as a calf management consultant.

DR. DAVE LEGER – Antimicrobial resistance and usage continues to be a hot topic for farmers, with changes to regulations regarding how and when antibiotics can be used in livestock anticipated in the near future. Dr. Dave Leger from the Public Health Agency of Canada joins the exceptional line-up of speakers at the 2016 Healthy Calf Conference hosted by Veal Farmers of Ontario (VFO), your calf care partners.  Dr. Leger will discuss frameworks, action plans, regulatory changes and your role, as a producer, in antibiotic stewardship.

Following his graduation from the Ontario Veterinary College in 1983, Dr. Leger worked in mixed rural practice for 16 years with a focus on dairy production management. He was also a participant in the first Dairy Health Management Certificate program. Upon returning to the University of Guelph in 1999, he completed his Master’s degree in epidemiology, where his graduate research focused on antimicrobial resistance in Ontario free stall dairy herds. Dr. Leger currently leads the Antimicrobial Use Working Group and Farm Surveillance component of the Canadian Integrated Program for Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance (CIPARS).

DR. DAVE RENAUD – One of Ontario’s up and coming leaders in calf management, Dr. Dave Renaud from the University of Guelph, joins the exceptional line-up of speakers at the 2016 Dairy and Veal Healthy Calf Conference hosted by Veal Farmers of Ontario (VFO), your calf care partners.  Dr. Renaud will share his current research on assessing calf health and provide an update on Salmonella Dublin, an emerging and destructive pathogen already detected in the province.

Dr. Renaud is a PhD candidate with the Department of Population Medicine at the Ontario Veterinary College. His PhD project focuses on examining causes of calf morbidity and mortality in the Ontario dairy and veal industries, with the ultimate goal of determining why some calves become sick while others thrive. He developed a specific interest in the health and welfare of dairy calves during his time working with a large veal operation. Dr. Renaud is also currently involved in the development of the National Farm Animal Care Council’s “Code of Practice for the Care and Handling of Veal Cattle”.

ROSE KEUNEN – Making informed management decisions is one of the keys to success on any farm operation. Rose Keunen of Henro Dairy Farms joins the exceptional line-up of speakers at the 2016 Dairy and Veal Healthy Calf Conference hosted by Veal Farmers of Ontario (VFO), your calf care partners.  Rose will be sharing her family’s successes in calf management achieved by implementing streamlined protocols.

Rose and Henry Keunen began milking 80 cows after immigrating to Canada from the Netherlands in 1997. Today, the family milks 380 cows and grow 800 acres of corn, soybeans, and alfalfa. Among the various recognitions, Henro Dairy Farms was the recipient of the Premier’s Award for Agri-Food Innovation Excellence in 2013. They have also been featured over the past three years in the Dairy Farmers of Canada’s nationwide multi-media campaign. Rose is a past member of the Dairy Advisory Committee for the University of Guelph, Ridgetown Campus and the past president of the Oxford Women for the Support of Agriculture. She actively promotes dairy farming and dairy products and has written many articles for the dairy industry. Rose was a finalist for the Royal Bank of Canada Canadian Women Entrepreneur Awards, as a Trailblazer, in 2012 and 2013.