Dairy cows are vulnerable to heat stress. As temperatures rise, so does a cow’s body temperature and respiratory rate as she pants to cool down. 

Before the summer months arrive, it’s important to prepare for the potential havoc heat can cause to your cattle.

Biological systems are amazing. One can’t even begin to comprehend the number of signaling pathways and exchanges required for life to exist, and what is more profound is so many of those systems are involuntary.

With heat stress comes lameness and negative impacts on hoof health. In fact, heat stress is one of the biggest factors contributing to dairy cow lameness.

The impact of heat stress is cumulative. One event may be easy for a cow to bounce back from, but over time, repeated bouts take longer recovery and hinder profitability. Nutrition is a valuable tool to help mitigate the effects of heat stress and maintain herd productivity.

Heat stress occurs when an animal generates and absorbs more heat than it can dissipate through respiration, sweating or active cooling. Rumination generates large amounts of heat, so when a cow is hot, her first response is typically to eat less feed.

Designing a natural ventilation system for your dairy involves putting together two necessary elements that create optimum conditions for year-round cow comfort.

A cow’s core body temperature can rise very quickly in the holding pen without a cooling strategy in place. Therefore, the cooling strategy for the parlor and holding pen must be more aggressive to compensate for these heat abatement challenges.