lazy farmer
Member
- Location
- som/dor border
what I find truly mystifying is how on earth my fellow block calvers and I make any money given the animal abuse we all dish out to our cows
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Cell count targets.
- Thread starter Clay52
- Start date
Although this has nothing really to do with me @bovine comments have really rubbed me up the wrong way. Saying low yielding herds cut costs by being cruel is nonsense. In my experience its the high yielding herds having health issues cause by 365 days a year on concrete and selecting for yeild above more important health traits. I am not saying all high input systems are bad, just that you can not dismiss all block calvers because they don't line your pockets quite as nicely. On top of that please enlighten me on how high yielding cows are more efficient once you take in to account the silage making and transporting cake not to mention the extra replacements needed.
My point is very simple - we are talking about cell counts. My belief is that individual cell count recording is a vital tool in managing cows, and it is impossible without some cell count data to safely dry cows off using a selective dry cow therapy approach. I simply observed that block calving (particularly spring calving ones) are less likely to milk record, as they are keen on keeping costs minimal. I never used the word cruel. I made a simple observation that fits with my experiences - if you have some data showing higher numbers of these herds do milk record, then show me it and I will apologise.
Higher yielding cows are more efficient because a cow has a maintenance requirement. That is relatively fixed and therefore a cow producing 60 litres of milk per day produces less CO2 per litre than one producing 30 litres. You waste energy walking to grazing, waste energy keeping warm etc. I read a very interesting report on the Nocton Dairy plan looking at efficiency and CO2 production and bigger farms with high yielding cows were vastly more efficient in terms of CO2 production. The environmentalists keep that one quiet.
No one with half a brain is selecting just for yield, have a look at the work done with genomics. You can have a fertile, healthy cow that gives a lot of milk (ie is very efficient).
Higher yielding cows are more efficient because a cow has a maintenance requirement. That is relatively fixed and therefore a cow producing 60 litres of milk per day produces less CO2 per litre than one producing 30 litres. You waste energy walking to grazing, waste energy keeping warm etc. I read a very interesting report on the Nocton Dairy plan looking at efficiency and CO2 production and bigger farms with high yielding cows were vastly more efficient in terms of CO2 production. The environmentalists keep that one quiet.
No one with half a brain is selecting just for yield, have a look at the work done with genomics. You can have a fertile, healthy cow that gives a lot of milk (ie is very efficient).
Clay52
Member
- Location
- Outer Space
Nope. I know I have read about it before. I think on some university website. Never looked into any further.
It's not something that worried me so I didn't waste anymore time with it.
Clay52
Member
- Location
- Outer Space
Problem here is you have mentioned high yield. That is a dirty word to many here and that may hinder some people seeing your point.
Higher yielding is more efficient feed energy wise for the cow. Even though people will, it's not debatable. Maintenance energy doesn't change that much even with smaller cows.
Problem with it is on paper increasing yield almost always looks better for profit, often much better. In reality it doesn't always work out that way. People make a change to increase yield but don't always factor in all the costs. It doesn't take much to chew up that extra income from high yield.
In the high yield vs low cost system debate. Both systems can work very well and both can be a failure. It comes down to the overall management of the business.
Clay52
Member
- Location
- Outer Space
what I find truly mystifying is how on earth my fellow block calvers and I make any money given the animal abuse we all dish out to our cows
But that's not what he said was it.
Irish NZ
Member
- Location
- The mighty Waikato NZ
Those who can't do... teach.
Or spout crap on the Internet...
lazy farmer
Member
- Location
- som/dor border
Well @bovine whilst the actual word cruel was indeed not used in your Sweeping statement it was inferred.
As to your supposedly corrective statement all I can do is state As I find. My discussion group would have at least 50% doing some sort of milk recording. In our own case.we dry cow tube less than 25%. Currently all eligible cows are going in the tank of a dreadful avg yield of 24 litres 23 days after the start of calving. Our cell count is 142. I will quite happily PM you my details if you want to report me for lower welfare standards.
As for nocton. Did you really expect there report to say any different? As you have read the report please could you forward us the sections on higher young stock numbers. Deforestation. The negative carbon effects of continuous ploughing and the carbon costs of importing protein. Many thanks. Lazy
As to your supposedly corrective statement all I can do is state As I find. My discussion group would have at least 50% doing some sort of milk recording. In our own case.we dry cow tube less than 25%. Currently all eligible cows are going in the tank of a dreadful avg yield of 24 litres 23 days after the start of calving. Our cell count is 142. I will quite happily PM you my details if you want to report me for lower welfare standards.
As for nocton. Did you really expect there report to say any different? As you have read the report please could you forward us the sections on higher young stock numbers. Deforestation. The negative carbon effects of continuous ploughing and the carbon costs of importing protein. Many thanks. Lazy
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We never had any surprises.
My dad recorded and was pedigree for his whole 31 year milking career,all it did was cost him a lot of money,the chap who bought his cows never even looked at his records or pedigrees.
How come I'm the best herd in my discussion group?
- Location
- Pembrokeshire
The top part of the post is right , the bottom part is complete and utter rubbish.
- Location
- Pembrokeshire
Same here apart from the Ayr calving bit. We also milk record for johnes tag and test for bvd and milk record for yield ( spring block calving)
- Location
- M6 Hard shoulder
Did I miss anything interesting in the last 24 hrs ????
I can not dispute that a cows maintenance energy requirements do not vary depending on it's milk output, I am disputing that high yielding cows are more environmentally friendly. High yielding cows are generally housed for a large proportion, if not all the year. This means all there food has to be brought them and unless you are still using a wheel barrow this involves diesel. All the forage has to be ensiled using vast amounts of diesel and then brought back to the cows with even more diesel. The silage is also of lower quality than the grass growing in the field and to make matters worse the housed cows produce waste. This then has to be scrapped out, using diesel and spread back on the field with even more diesel. Somehow I think grassing systems may be better for the environment
- Location
- Owaka, New Zealand
^^^^ but worse for salesmen, mechanics, and vets...
Constant debate in NZ about whether to adopt the housing systems etc, obviously depends largely on environmental/climatical reasons.
Been a long time since I've milked a herd with a BMSCC average higher than 100,000. Alarm bells start at about 85k, last management job we treated about 4-5% of the herd per year for clinical mastitis. No silage. No pre dipping/wiping/spraying. Post spray via a dodgy auto sprayer that sprayed legs in a wind. Putting a man on to supervise the ACRs made the SCC drop 50k from the previous seasons. Blanket DCT on the whole herd bar culls.
Previous job 420 cows thru 30 aside, average SCC 75k, jumped to 95k when feeding silage. Treated 4% for clinical mastitis, 5% for footrot one year. SCC was high when we started, due to stray power in the shed. Blanket DCT.
Organic farm before that, average BMSCC was 55,000 for the season, been organic 18 years, great systems. Good cows, no teatspray at any time, vet came once to scan in March. No teat seal or DCT other than a squirt of warm Manuka honey for any high SCC suspects.
I don't think you can categorize how good a farmer is by the size of the herd or the number of measurements taken. I think a good farmer is just a good farmer, and I don't claim to be one yet
Constant debate in NZ about whether to adopt the housing systems etc, obviously depends largely on environmental/climatical reasons.
Been a long time since I've milked a herd with a BMSCC average higher than 100,000. Alarm bells start at about 85k, last management job we treated about 4-5% of the herd per year for clinical mastitis. No silage. No pre dipping/wiping/spraying. Post spray via a dodgy auto sprayer that sprayed legs in a wind. Putting a man on to supervise the ACRs made the SCC drop 50k from the previous seasons. Blanket DCT on the whole herd bar culls.
Previous job 420 cows thru 30 aside, average SCC 75k, jumped to 95k when feeding silage. Treated 4% for clinical mastitis, 5% for footrot one year. SCC was high when we started, due to stray power in the shed. Blanket DCT.
Organic farm before that, average BMSCC was 55,000 for the season, been organic 18 years, great systems. Good cows, no teatspray at any time, vet came once to scan in March. No teat seal or DCT other than a squirt of warm Manuka honey for any high SCC suspects.
I don't think you can categorize how good a farmer is by the size of the herd or the number of measurements taken. I think a good farmer is just a good farmer, and I don't claim to be one yet
Ducati899
Member
- Location
- north dorset
Back on subject,mine are usually between 100-120,if they get up around 150 somethings happened and usually that's the cubicle cleaning has lapsed
Headless chicken
Member
- Location
- West Wales
Some people really don't have a good working relationship with they're vets here. To us they're part of the team and if you've got a good one you get out more than you put in. As a block calver I won't seem them now really until we start calving again.
On the note of cell counts we normally run 150-180. This winter 180-300 be a really crappy one. We know why but can't change it until cows go out. They're still too high and we're dealing with the backlog from them. I suspect we will dry a higher than normal amount of with AB and then get back to normal next lactation.
On the note of cell counts we normally run 150-180. This winter 180-300 be a really crappy one. We know why but can't change it until cows go out. They're still too high and we're dealing with the backlog from them. I suspect we will dry a higher than normal amount of with AB and then get back to normal next lactation.
Clay52
Member
- Location
- Outer Space
I don't really want a relationship with the vet. If I am seeing them regularly that means things are going wrong. They actually rang up the other day asking why I hadn't being buying mastitis tubes off them. I said I'd only had a few cases in the last couple months. They seemed dissapointed.
In my experience when cell count goes high for an extended period a certain percentage of cows are ruined. To get back to normal a certain amount of culling your way back to normal has to happen. That's just what i found.
Adam@Rumen
Member
- Location
- Nantwich/Rishton