Herd Health

On a typical day, how often do cows interact with people on your dairy?

It’s common for a dairy team to mingle with a herd at least two or three times for milking, again if it’s a herd health day, again for breeding, again if pen shifts are on the schedule and probably again if any additional management interventions are needed.

Cows are in negative energy balance (NEB) when their energy requirements (i.e., maintenance, gestation, production) are not met by their energy intake.

The optimal dry period length between lactations in dairy cows has been debated since the early 1800s. During this time, some English farmers believed a two-month dry period was optimal, while others believed a two-week dry period was adequate.

Managing cows through the end of the dry period and into their next lactation remains a challenge across many dairy farms. Much of this is driven by what we ask cows to handle throughout the weeks before and after calving.

Take a moment to think about your last cow to calve. Was it smooth sailing or were there complications? If a complication arose, has this issue occurred before?

My inquisitive 11-year-old recently asked me if a newborn child belonging to a family we know was in the hospital because the baby didn’t get enough colostrum. Wow. I could tell by the look on his face it was going to be a long conversation when I told him human babies don’t need colostrum like calves do.