Opinion, including Complimentary Commercial Content
Dairy cows are expected to last 10 seasons. But New Zealand dairy producers are culling cows that should have been in their prime. Their udders simply aren’t holding up. Udders are blowing out, and some cows have had poor suspensory ligaments which became evident when they got a bit of age, shared producer Reg Davey.
Udder conformation is a high priority in cow development domestically and globally:
- Udder traits are the most heavily weighted in the dairy cow unified score card yielding 40 percent <Link>.
- Pendulous udders, flat and inverted teat-end, very long and thick teats are more susceptible to intra-mammary infection <Link>.
- Methods of controlling mastitis in the dry period have focused primarily on the use of antibiotics which continue to be severely scrutinized.
- Antibiotic therapy at drying off does not appear to prevent new infections in the periparturient period, likely due to lack of persistence of antibiotics <Link>.
Sources: The Bullvine, May 28, 2021. Link.
Discussion: Somatic cell counts are a longstanding marker of milk quality, affecting shelf life, flavor and revenue. Dairy farmers monitor them as a measure of the health of their lactating cows <Link>. Cows with the best udder traits frequently produce the most milk.
During the dry-off period non-lactating cows face unique problems with respect to mastitis control. Susceptibility to mastitis is elevated during the early dry period and prior to parturition. Further, environmental pathogens are not easily controlled. Poorer udder confirmation is one factor that can increase mastitis susceptibility.
One goal of the dry period is to have as few quarters infected with bacteria as possible at calving. Keeping dry cows cool, dry and comfortable is critical in terms of udder health<Link>.
INSIGHTS: Administration of dry cow therapy to all quarters of all cows at the end of lactation is a common practice. However, given information on pre-parturition infections, it is important to use the right anti-infective and to avoid damage to non-infected quarters.
Our June 1, 2021 post, Proper antibiotic use improves producer savings and dairy industry image <Link>, Linda Tikofsky, DVM, suggested being more thoughtful about antibiotic use to preserve it as an important tool for the long term.
Since subclinical mastitis is often undetected at dry-off, we shared information about Advanced Animal Diagnostics’ point of care QScout® MLD (milk leukocyte differential) test <Link>. It can accurately detect subclinical mastitis in individual quarters in just minutes per cow reducing wait time and potential treatment expense while helping increase the value of the dry-off resting period for cows.