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How this farm is tightening its calving season through fertility management

The dairy herd at the College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise (CAFRE) fulfils two main roles – student training and the demonstration of best management practice to dairy farmers through knowledge and technology transfer.

Stephen Gilkinson, a dairying technologist at the college said: “Cows in the CAFRE dairy herd have traditionally calved from the last few days of August right through the winter into late spring. Two-thirds of the herd are calved by Christmas and the rest spread over the next four months.”

“While this has helped spread milk production through the year, it is not ideal from a management perspective, as there are usually cows in early lactation, late lactation and dry cows all at the same time, which complicates herd management.”

By having a much higher percentage of cows calving in the autumn, this means that the majority of cows can go to grass settled in-calf and be easier to manage to achieve good milk production from grazed grass during the main grazing season.”

Drying off

“Cows will also start to dry off from early August onwards, as grass growth is declining but a considerable proportion will still be grazing in late summer and early autumn to utilize late-season grass.”

“Previously, cows had been starting to be dried off from early July, which meant that for these cows, the proportion of fresh grass in their diet was very limited. Delaying the start of calving until the end of September will increase the amount of grazed grass in the diet and help to increase the milk from forage figures.

He said that the tighter autumn and early winter calving pattern will also allow CAFRE to take advantage of milk price seasonality bonuses. In addition, replacement heifer rearing to first calving at two years of age will also be made easier with heifers batched within narrower age ranges.

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“In recent years, CAFRE staff with veterinary assistance from Firmount Veterinary Practice have been working to tighten the calving pattern, by delaying the start of calving from late August to late September, increasing the proportion of cows calving before January and ending the breeding season earlier each summer.

Tighter calving

The progress made to date in tightening up the calving pattern has been achieved through the fertility management programme applied within the CAFRE dairy herd which includes:

  • Breeding heifers from sires selected for strongly positive daughter fertility;
  • Veterinary examination of cows before the start of the breeding season;
  • Efficient heat detection by staff with first service submission rates typically of 90%;
  • Use of heat detection aids to assist with heat detection;
  • Weekly veterinary pregnancy diagnosis visits during the breeding season;
  • Regular condition scoring of the herd and closely monitoring and reviewing herd nutrition with feed suppliers.

Year

Calving Sep to Dec 1st

Calving Jan 1st onwards

2015/16

68%

32%

2016/17

69%

31%

2017/18

72%

28%

2018/19

78%

22%

2019/20

80%

20%

2020/21 (projected)

92%

8%

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