May Production
May Production Down 0.4%
Milk production in May was down 0.4% across all states compared to last year, according to USDA. Total production sat at 19.055 billion pounds, up from 18.468 billion pounds in April.
Within the 24 major dairy producing states, production was down 0.1% in May compared to last year. Total production in May was at 18.1 billion pounds in those states, up from a USDA-revised 17.6 billion pounds in April.
Production per cow averaged just 11 pounds higher than May 2018, but 63 pounds higher than April 2019.
While cow numbers have seen a steady decline for several months, the U.S. herd added 5,000 cows in May compared to April, but is still down 89,000 head from May 2018. Even the slight bump in cow numbers was unexpected, given the increased slaughter totals.
Here's how state production totals fared. Here are the states with the biggest drops:
- Illinois: -11.4%
- Virginia: -10.1%
- Pennsylvania: -7%
- Florida: -4.9%
- Ohio: -4.4%
- Arizona: -4.3%
States with the biggest gains were:
- Texas: +5.4%
- Colorado: +3.6%
Other states of note were:
- Idaho: +1.4%
- California: +1.3%
- Wisconsin: -0.4%