Shortening the dry period to less than 60 days has been promoted during the past few years.

Can you imagine running a marathon without proper training? The 26-mile trek from start gate to finish line would be challenging without proper conditioning, diet and preparation. Now, think of the 305-day lactation dairy cow’s experience.

Intrigued by the possibility of building a better heifer? Want to develop your herd’s potential? If you answered, “Yes,” your next question probably is, “What will it cost?” Will you really get some bang for your buck (i.e., milk in the tank)?

The National Animal Health and Monitoring System (NAHMS) has conducted three surveys in 1991, 1996, and 2002, of U.S. dairies that includes information on health and management practices involving dairy calves. The pre-weaning mortality rates ranged from 8.4 to 10.8 percent in these surveys.

Production agriculture is unique because raising replacement animals is a normal part of day-to-day business operations and is an operating expense. The replacements are an asset on the balance sheet and for most dairies become the primary productive asset of the business.

Simply putting cows out to pasture during their dry period is a thing of the past. Today’s dairy needs a dry cow management program to ensure healthy cows and consequently, healthy calves.

On some dairy operations dry cows are “out of sight, out of mind.” While it’s important to keep the dry period as uneventful as possible, we still need to monitor dry cow activity to ensure cows have every opportunity to calve successfully and begin profitable lactations.

Preventative and low-level (feed) use of antibiotics in food animals have been incriminated as causes for antibiotic resistance in human pathogens. As a result of this concern, the European Commission has banned low-level feeding of antibiotics to cattle for growth promotion or disease prevention.

Replacements are an investment in the future of a dairy, and they are significant, often representing 15 to 20 percent of the total cost of milk production, which is second only to dairy feed costs. The likelihood of a positive payoff on those investments is dramatically improved when the management team has a system in place that generates quality heifers.

The investment in proper heifer care is not an overnight return. Almost two years of feeding and care goes into heifers before they start producing milk. That’s why getting heifers into the milking string sooner while ensuring proper health is so critical.