The objectives of this research were to characterize dry period lengths for US Jerseys, determine the effects of days dry (DD) on subsequent lactation actual milk, fat, and protein yields, fat and protein percentages, somatic cell score (SCS), and days open (DO), and to determine the dry period length that maximizes yield across lactations. Field data, collected through the Dairy Herd Improveme...

producers. This loss is estimated at $750 million annually nationwide. Calving difficulty increases calf death loss, cow mortality, labor and veterinary costs; it delays the return of cows to estrus and reduces conception rates. It also lowers calf weaning weight and market value, which results from breeding of young heifers and cows to easy calving bulls to reduce calving difficulty. Studies s...

To investigate the effects of certain factors on the rate of retained placenta, 2844 calving records from 1288 Holstein cows in a herd were used. These cows calved during year period of 2001 to 2007. A generalized statistical linear model was applied to analyze the data. Logistic regression model was applied as the statistical model. In the model, fixed effects of year, season (warm or cold) an...

objective: the cows that don’t have access to sufficient energy in their ration can get sickness. milk production has a high priority in metabolism of dairy cows so lactating cows are more prone to get sick this can ruin all the benefits of higher milk yield because of the higher prevalence of the disorders. methods: data for this research had gathered from a herd with 1600 holstein cattle in e...

Calving difficulty was analyzed under threshold and linear models considering either a fixed or random herd-year effect. The aim of the study was to compare models for predicting breeding values according to the size of herd-year groups. When simulating data sets with small herds, in order to obtain an unbiased evaluation under a nonrandom and negative association of sire and herd effects, the ...

The main reason for calving replacement heifers early is economics. Economic assessments (2) have demonstrated that heifer rearing cost increases $50.00 to $60.00 each month calving is delayed. In addition, older calving ages result in the need for more heifers for herd replacement. These classic concepts are presented in Table 1. Conceptually, as calving age is reduced there is a linear reduct...

p REPARTUM and post-partum energy intake has been shown to influence reproductive performance of beef cows (Wiltbank et al., 1962, 1964). A low level of energy before calving was shown to delay onset of estrus following calving. Marked differences in conception rate were noted in cows on varying levels of energy following calving. Conception rate was decreased by low levels of energy after calv...

Calving in cattle is affected by calf morphology and by dam characteristics. It is described by two different traits: maternal calving ease, which is the ability to generate dams with good physiological predisposition to calving, and direct calving ease, which is the ability to generate calves that are easily born. The aim of this study was to identify regions of cattle genome harboring genes p...

Iteroparous mothers often face a trade-off between further investments in current offspring at the expense of the start of the next reproductive cycle. In the strongly seasonal environments at northern latitudes, large herbivores are typically calving in early summer each year to get a long growth season and to hit peak protein levels of vegetation. Late-born offspring are more likely to die si...

During the periparturient period, some impairment of immune defences were observed. Reference values for the different non-specific immune parameters in cows are not generally available, thus limiting the application of these parameters in dairy practice. This paper reports the data on the measurements of different parameters in the blood, and explores the possible influence of the herd on the ...