Garret Oetzel, a veterinary professor at the University of Wisconsin, reminds us that dairy cows are prone to six metabolic disorders that can knock them out of the game. This is due to the tremendous load on their metabolism to perform. Veterinary hospital teams and sales personnel who call on dairies will find this article to be a resource when working with dairy producers to maximize production.
Source: Dairy Herd Management, July 7, 2016.
Oetzel identifies these metabolic disorders as the “Sinister 6”:
- Hypocalcemia, or milk fever
- Hypophosphatemia
- Hypomagnesemia, or grass tetany
- Hypokalemia
- Ketosis, the most common
- Displaced abomasum