Archive for 2012

1.Weanling heifers need to be gaining weight to achieve breeding size next Spring.  Grass quality is not sufficient. Concentrate supplementation with 18 to 20% C.P. 2.Condition score your cows.  Dry off in-calf cows which are BCS of 2.0 and feed them to gain BCS.   3.Identify empty cows by scanning and plan on culling strategy. […]

A client outside Ballingarry, Co. Limerick, was telling me that he had planned to sell a group of in calf Holstein heifers. However, he was informed by a buyer for the Russian market that the heifers meet all the criteria, except milk recording records for their cows. In calf heifers for this market are currently […]

On a farm visit in Co Offaly, a client complained about mould contamination in purchased bales of silage. He had to purchase baled silage for his herd of Brown Swiss cows due to feed shortages. He claimed that he had no problems with mould contamination when he ensured that 22 wraps of silage encased his […]

The cost of concentrates is approximately 8.5 pence sterling per litre of milk sold from 1 farm in the North of Ireland. Calving patterns in the north of Ireland are non-seasonal. Flat rate feeding of cows results in a disproportionate supply of concentrate requirements between fresh and stale cows. This results in feed to yield […]

Visited a client in County Cork who presented a herd of dairy cows and maiden heifers for scanning.  The overall reproductive performance in the dairy herd was average for those herds scanned to date this year.  However, the reproductive performance of the maiden heifers was very poor.  Of 21 heifers scanned, the pregnancy rate to […]

Visited a client in County Cork who presented a group of cows and heifers. Pregnancy rates were 50% in his dairy cows and close to 30% in his maiden heifers. Scanning revealed that the structures of the uterine horns were not normal in a number of the maiden heifers not confirmed pregnant. This condition has […]

On a farm visit in County Kerry cows were at least half a body score below their target for the stage of lactation. Scanning revealed an association with abnormal structure of the uterine horns. A high incidence of embryonic death occurred on this farm.

We scanned a cow with triplets on a farm visit in Co. Armagh. The cow was 77 days pregnant. She had 2 pregnancies in the 1 uterine horn and 1 pregnancy in the other uterine horn. I managed to sex the pregnancies, with there being 2 females and 1 male with a 98% probability that […]

On a monthly farm visit we scanned a dairy herd in Co. Derry. They have used zero grazing throughout the wet summer to achieve maximum intakes from harvested chopped grass drawn in on a daily basis. The key here in their opinion is keeping fresh chopped grass in front of the cows on a daily […]

On a farm visit in Co. Derry. I noted a dramatic improvement in body condition score and reproductive health, from a previous visit 8 weeks ago. An investigation after the last visit revealed mycotoxin contamination of forages fed to the cows. Unfortunately insufficient consideration is given to this issue and its impact on human health […]