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Most of the producers I work with on a daily basis have dreams and clear goals for the future of their operations. This may include milk production benchmarks, income over feed cost targets, gains in reproduction rates, genetic improvement or bringing a new generation into the dairy.
When they were first introduced a decade or more ago, fresh cow monitoring protocols were new in scope and design. Progressive producers quickly implemented these practices to track every cow after calving, diligently taking daily temperatures, noting physical signs of metabolic disorders, employing drenching or other treatment protocols as needed and spending lots of time with these animals each day.
“I’m the cow guy here,” says dairy producer Steve Bollant, who runs a 695-cow dairy and grows 1,800 acres of crops together with his brother near Stitzer, Wisconsin. “I am the one who always walked all of the pens eight to 10 times a day, looking for heats and checking the cows. Physically, I was getting so I couldn’t do it anymore.”
Dairy producers and their advisers spend a great deal of time and effort to develop protocols that standardize the routine actions needed to care for dairy cows.
By their definition, these standard operating procedures, or SOPs, should virtually eliminate variation in performance of daily dairy activities, regardless of who completes them.
Heifers are generally the most fertile animals on a dairy. Research shows that the mean U.S. conception rate for dairy heifers is 57 percent, so it’s not unusual for dairy heifer reproductive performance to be taken for granted while focusing on the lactating herd.
Previously, we established that defining dairy cow health status is not always a black and white issue. That’s because while the vast majority of cows on dairies are healthy and a few are easily identified as sick, a certain percentage of cows don’t fit in either category.
These are the cows that fall into the “gray area.” These animals do not stand out. They don’t show visual signs of illness or underperformance, but neither are they functioning at full capacity.
Observation skills and experience are extremely beneficial to managing the health and performance of a dairy herd.
Perceptive practitioners of animal husbandry can often tell you at a glance whether an animal is under the weather or is feeling perfectly fine by walking pens, observing feed intakes and monitoring cow behavior for important hints. And they are investing in technology like rumination monitoring to help with this essential task.
With an annual pregnancy rate of 21 percent, the herd at D&D Dairy near Rushford, Minnesota, significantly exceeded the industry average for reproductive performance. But co-owner Dean Smith knew the dairy could do better.
The old adage “knowledge is power” certainly rings true when it comes to cow health. Entire management protocols and systems are designed around the quest to identify cows that are feeling subpar, perform needed interventions and quickly get them back on track.
