This publication is written primarily for use during and after the seminars entitled Increase Productivity and Profit Without Increasing Purchased Feed Costs to be held during the week of October 24-28 in five locations in Northern New York. This seminar is the first in the Progressive Agriculture in Northern New York Seminar series sponsored by Cooperative Extension. The remaining three seminars and their dates are: Cropping Strategies for Optimum Production in Northern New York: Week of December 6. Economic Outlook and Opportunities it Presents for the Future: Week of January 16. Agriculture and Your Part in the Computer Revolution: Week of February 13. The overall purpose of this seminar is to provide nutrition and economic information to dairy producers and agribusiness representatives to improve their understanding of economical dairy cattle feeding and improve the utilization of forages in feeding dairy cattle. Specifically, the objectives are: l. To understand the economic situation facing dairy producers in the mid-1980's. 2. To understand how the cow and especially the rumen functions. 3. To understand the nutritional and economic importance of intake. 4. To understand how to utilize nutrition and economic concepts to formulate rations that stimulate production while minimizing purchased feed costs.