Livestock

Ewes: Looking After The Next Generation

Whether breeding as ewe lambs or as gimmers, looking after these young ewes will positively affect the flock performance for the next year and improve their lifetime productivity. The ewe that lambs down well in her first year will stand a greater chance of lambing down well in future years. The first step is focusing on their nutrition to get them to target mating weights.

Watch Condition of Autumn Calving Cows

While it is ideal to manage cow condition throughout the year, this is often easier said than done. Cows on good quality grass will put on condition rapidly. Having over fat cows at calving time can cause issues with calving difficulty, fat cows also have a higher risk of metabolic issues around calving time.

Magnesium For Autumn Calving Herds

When we think about magnesium deficiency, we automatically think about grass staggers. Many suckler herds do not experience problems with staggers in the spring and it tends to be in the autumn that staggers is more common, due to changeable and stormy weather conditions and a high passage rate of lush, wet grass through the digestive tract. For autumn calving cows, the risk of staggers is lower pre-calving compared to lactating cows at this time as they have a lower requirement for magnesium. However low magnesium pre-calving can cause metabolic issues around calving time such as subclinical milk fever or slow calving syndrome.