The first few weeks into the New Year have been feeling more like winter with snow and temperatures in the single digits. The cows are faring well, and the new year brings excitement for change and new opportunities. It’s a good time to reflect on last year’s trials and victories as well as planning for progress. Change is good, but sometimes a solid routine paves the way for success. Part of our weekly routine at the dairy barn is doing our pen moves every Tuesday.
We do pen moves in our lactating and non-lactating mature cow pens. We move them to different pens based on their stage in lactation, and each pen is fed a specific diet tailored to their needs. We have a fresh group that is monitored closely every day for two weeks to make sure they are healthy and comfortable. Fresh cows stay in the fresh group from the day they calve until 15 days in milk when they’re moved out of this group.
We have high and low production groups. In the high groups, cows average 120 pounds of milk daily. Most of the cows in our high production pen are around 125 days in milk. High production groups are fed a high-energy ration. Cows in our low production groups average 80 pounds per day. The majority of the cows in this group are 200+ dim and are fed a low- energy diet. Cows in our low groups are generally closer to the end of their lactation. Mature cows will stay in the low group until they have reached 227 days carried calf (DCC), and then will be dried off. First lactation cows are dried off at 223 DCC while cows that are pregnant with twins will be dried off at 210 DCC. Sometimes there will be a special case where a cow is ready to be dried off but is still making 85-90 pounds of milk a day. In this case we move her to a maternity pen and instead of milking her 3 times a day we’ll start milking her only 2X for a couple days and then only once a day to encourage her milk production to slow down. We’ll also start feeding her the “far off” dry cow diet. Once her production has dropped below 40 pounds she’s finally ready to be dried off and moved to our far dry group.
We use two different intramammary dry off treatments. If a cow’s somatic cell count is higher than 200 she will be treated with Spectramast dry cow treatment. Cows with somatic cell counts under 200 will be treated with Albadry treatment. Cows stay in the far dry group until they have reached 260 DCC and then are moved to our close-up bedded pack where they stay until they calve. Pregnant heifers are also moved to the close-up bedded pack from our offsite heifer facility at 260 DCC. A benefit we experience by completing pen moves each week is the ability to tailor the diets to specific milk production and stage in lactation. While pen moves are necessary and benefit herd production, they could increase the risk of injury to the cows. It’s crucial to identify slippery flooring and make sure any maintenance or repairs to the pens, floor scrapers, and gates are finished before moves begin to prevent injuries. We spread ground lime where the footing is especially slippery to prevent cows from falling and getting injured. We also make sure all staff responsible for sorting and moving cows to different pens have completed training and have proficient stockmanship skills.
— Mackenzie Abbati