New York dairy herds produced 1.13 billion pounds of milk during May, a 0.4% decrease  compared to May 2009, said Stephen Ropel, director of USDA's National Agricultural Statistics Service.

Milk cows declined while production per cow was up from the previous year. The number of milk cows averaged 610,000 head, down 13,000 head from May of the previous year. Milk per cow averaged 1,850 pounds, up 30 pounds from the May 2009 rate.

Dairy farmers in the Empire State received an average of US$15.90 per hundredweight of milk sold during May, up 40 cents from April and US$3.20 more than May a year ago.

Milk production in the 23 major states during May totalled 15.7 billion pounds, up 1.3% from May 2009. April revised production at 15.2 billion pounds, was up 1.8% from April 2009. The April revision represented an increase of 14 million pounds or 0.1% from last month's preliminary production estimate.

Production per cow in the 23 major states averaged 1,889 pounds for May, 55 pounds above May 2009. The number of milk cows on farms in the 23 major states was 8.33 million head, 143,000 head less than May 2009, but 4,000 head more than April 2010.