Editor’s note: This is the second of a three-part series. Click here to read the first article. I wrote in the first part of this series that it is important for the dairyman to first find out what he’s fighting and then work with the herd veterinarian on the treatment. By knowing what is causing the mastitis on their farm, the dairyman and their herd veterinarian are able to use the appropriate antimicrobial drugs. Armed with this knowledge, they may see a decrease in the total treatment duration or a reduction in the use of unnecessary broad-spectrum antimicrobials.

In the field of post-mortem examination, experienced pathologists develop a sixth sense. I encountered that sixth sense while a first-year resident at Cornell University, in the middle of a winter morning. At 11 a.m. our lab received a phone call letting us know about seven dead heifers from a farm in upstate New York.

For the last few years, agriculture has been discussing the terms animal welfare, animal rights, animal husbandry, animal handling and stockmanship. They all have unique meanings and nuances to different audiences. Stockmanship is a term more common in the beef cattle industry and can be defined as the art and science of handling cattle, or any other farm animal, properly. For many dairy owners and employees, stockmanship skills have been honed over time and become intuitive. Others working with dairy animals have old habits or simply lack adequate training.

Managing Salmonella disease is all about reducing risk. No dairy will ever be exempt from disease exposure, because Salmonella is sneaky and can enter a dairy herd through a number of ways. Recent cattle purchases or heifers that have returned from a grower can carry disease. The boots or clothing of visitors or workers from a neighboring farm also presents a risk. Even rodents and birds nesting throughout the barn or hovering around feed bring the possibility of the spread of Salmonella bacteria to an operation.

No one questions the need for teat dip. It’s one of the most important products in the milking parlor and a key to protecting your cows’ udder health and your dairy’s milk quality. But the amount of iodine in commercial teat dip formulations is very much up for debate these days. The question is whether dairymen are getting what they’re paying for, says Allan Britten, president and laboratory director at Udder Health Systems. “It may not be an issue of efficacy or cow safety or animal health, but of value,” Britten says.