Performance [DA.HM.P]
Practical Assessment of Nutrition in the Milking Herd
Nutrition of the milking herd is usually seen as the responsibility of the farm’s nutritionist. However, there are many ways a herd manager or stockperson can assess whether nutrition is…
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Nutritional Guidance for the Milking Herd
Nutrition in dairy cattle is a complex area, and many farmers rely on their nutritionist to ensure that the ration for the milking herd is correctly formulated to optimise herd…
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MMN January 2024 – Spring Block Calving: How does your Herd Measure Up?
Measuring reproductive performance of the herd can allow comparison between years, areas for improvement can be identified and you can check the effectiveness of management changes made. Regular measuring and…
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MMN January 2024 – Colostrum Quality from Heifers
It is often said that the quality of colostrum (in terms of immunoglobin content or IgG) from heifers is not as good as that from cows. Older cows are likely…
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The Benefits of Rumination Monitoring
Cows will typically ruminate for around 500 minutes a day (7-8 hours) and a reduction in rumination time can be a sign that something is not quite right. Cows can…
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MMN November 2023 – The Power of Benchmarking
The importance of understanding the financial data within your business was one of the sessions at a recent dairy conference “Challenging the Norm: Future Dairy Systems”, held by SAC Consulting…
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MMN November 2023 – Investigating the Causes of Poor Milk Production
It can often be the case that cows are not milking according to expectation. While reviewing the current ration is a good starting point along with up-to-date forage analysis, there…
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MMN September 2023 – Rumen Audits: Maximising Livestock Health and Performance
Introduction Feeding the dairy cow equates to around 51% of the total cost of milk production (Teagasc, 2023). Therefore, maintaining good rumen health is vital to ensuring optimum feed utilisation…
Read More >Are your cows being fed sufficiently at grass?
As the longest day is now well past and nights are starting to draw in, milk production from grass is likely not as much as you think it is! Cows…
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Milk Manager News May 2023 – Making Smart Culling Decisions
Given the fall in milk prices since the start of the year and input costs still relatively high, it is really important to ensure that every cow in the herd…
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