Herd Management [DA.HM]

MMN March 2024 – How Long are your Heifers Lasting?

According to the recently published NMR 500 Herd KPI Report for 2023, the medium number of lactations per cow at exit was 3.6 and the culling rate was 28%, with…

MMN January 2024 – Selecting Beef Bulls for Use on Dairy

Sales of sexed dairy semen are increasing year-on-year and have been reported by AHDB to have reached 76.5% out of all dairy semen sales in the 12-month period up to…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

MMN November 2023 – Optimal Lighting for Dairy Cows

With margins being tight, it is important to consider marginal gains and what can be done to improve your existing system. There is widespread consensus around the beneficial effects of…

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…

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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