TRENDING TOPIC ARTICLE: HERD HEALTH This article was featured as one of our most popular herd health articles. to jump to the article below. University of Wisconsin’s Garret Oetzel and Boehringer Ingelheim Vetmedica, Inc.’s Brian Miller drilled down on the causes and effects of hypocalcemia. Many readers were likely surprised to learn that when combing clinical and subclinical cases, incidents of hypocalcemia in a 2,000-cow herd can cost a producer more than $60,000 a year. Oetzel is still providing information about the disease. Click here to read a recap of his presentation at the Four-State Dairy Nutrition and Management Conference in June, where he said nutritional management is the key to prevention.

One of the foundational elements of successful and profitable commercial dairy farming is the continuous entry of fresh cows into a milking herd. The fresh cow that’s in proper health will be the most cost-efficient cow on the dairy – having the highest feed-conversion-to-milk- production efficiency. Herd profiles that show low days in milk (DIM) indicate there are more cows freshening in a herd than there are cows headed for the dry corral. Even in the most desperate of economies, fresh cows are critical to keeping the business solvent.

The use of antibiotics and analgesics (pain medication) in the dairy industry is coming under increased scrutiny by regulators. Although other commodities have primarily been targeted in the past, a 2008 USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service study on meat residues found that dairy market (cull) cows and bob veal calves were responsible for a majority of the problems detected at slaughter. This has resulted in various groups wondering aloud if it would not be easier just to exclude the bob veal and market dairy cow from the food chain.

Bovine leukosis is a contagious disease of cattle caused by Bovine Leukemia Virus (BLV). The disease is characterized by a persistent leukemia which can culminate in malignant lymphosarcoma. The National Animal Health Monitoring System (NAHMS) determined that BLV is present in 89 percent of U.S. dairy operations. Only 30 to 40 percent of BLV carriers will develop leukemia, while less than 5 percent develop malignant lymphosarcoma. A later study determined the incidence of lymphosarcoma was six to seven cases per year per 1,000 cows if the herd prevalence of BLV was 50 percent.

I recently received a question by telephone about rubber flooring and what it does for the animal. I would like to share this conversation with you – from a hoof trimmer’s perspective. I have to admit that it is a subject with differing opinions, environments, climates and you name it, and that I certainly do not have all the answers to the flooring options available. I would like to start with a statement: “If you have a lot of lameness in your herd and that is the reason you want rubber in your alleys, then you are one station too far.” It is so important to understand the underlying reason for the lameness before deciding on any flooring option.

We all know the signs of a clinical salmonella case – sudden weight loss, weakness, fever, explosive diarrhea and dehydration. If a cow produced 50 pounds of milk last night and none this morning, you know that salmonella could be the cause. Although clinical cases are easy to spot, they can be only the tip of the salmonella iceberg. Other animals may harbor subclinical salmonellosis that can be just as damaging to your bottom line.

According to the current USDA data available in 2008, cull dairy cows accounted for just over 7 percent of all cattle slaughtered in the U.S., but were responsible for approximately 90 percent of carcasses in which drug residues were detected. Some of the more common reasons leading to having a carcass condemned for drug residues include: 1. Changing the dose or route for Procaine Penicillin G: The label dose for PPG is only 1 cc per 100 pounds, or about 15 cc total. When a cow is given higher doses or treated subcutaneously (under the skin), the slaughter withdrawal time can increase from the label four to 10 days up to several weeks.