In this episode, learn from National Mastitis Council president and director of Udder Health Systems Justine Britten as she and host Matti McBride discuss innovations that have changed how milk quality is managed on dairies, common problems in parlors, tips for sampling milk for mastitis cultures and more.

Every person reading this article likely has some idea of what it means to produce good, quality milk. But consider that milk quality varies depending on the perspective of consumers, processors and farmers.

Nationally, the average 2024 DHI test-day herd SCC was 181,000 cells per milliliter, unchanged from 2023, according to a summary report from the Council of Dairy Cattle Breeding (CDCB) and compared to previous reports from CDCB and the USDA’s Animal Improvement Programs Laboratory.

A farm decides on its own what its milk quality is. Wait, what? That’s right – the choices made daily determine milk quality. High-quality milk doesn’t happen by accident; it’s the result of intentional decisions in three key areas: 1) the people on the farm, 2) the environment the cows live in and 3) the tools provided to both the employees and the cows to ensure success. Let’s break it down.

Ever since 1894, Minglewood Dairy has upheld a tradition of exceptional care for their cows and land, evolving significantly over the past 130 years.

Routines to maintain udder health change with the transition to automated milking. In a parlor, most of the monitoring of the cow, the equipment, and to some extent the environment, is part of the milking routine. It is completed by the workers in the parlor as they prep, strip and attach milkers. In automated milking, it is important to develop daily routines to monitor those milk quality control points in other ways. 

Klebsiella is a gram-negative bacteria that can cause severe clinical mastitis in dairy cows. If they survive the illness, cows are often culled due to low milk production. This article describes some common ways Klebsiella is transmitted from the environment to teats and strategies on how to prevent Klebsiella mastitis cases on your farm.

The treatment of clinical mastitis has dramatically changed in the approximately 50 years of my veterinary career. The major focus has been on the proper and judicious use of antibiotics in dairy cattle and assuring the public there are no antibiotic residues in the milk supply.