HOW FEEDING THE CORRECT MINERALS DURING PREGNANCY BOOSTS COW AND CALF HEALTH AND PRODUCTIVITY
Raising strong, healthy cows isn’t just about the day-to-day feed and setting up future generations for success. Because calves rely on nutrients from their mother during fetal development, mineral intake during a cow’s pregnancy is one of the most important factors in achieving this goal. Known as ‘fetal programming,’ the idea is that a calf’s […]
MINERAL SUPPLEMENTS FOR POST-CALVING RECOVERY
Post-calving recovery is extremely important and we need to ensure our cows are transitioning smoothly from giving birth into milk production. Providing the right nutritional support through various vitamin and mineral supplements can boost their recovery and overall health. Post-calving recovery – trace minerals and vitamins Trace minerals and vitamins help to maintain a cow’s […]
EARLY LACTATION
I recently wrote an article for the Dairy Farmer around Early Lactation and its impact on dairy cows in New Zealand:
Early lactation, spanning both calving and mating, is a stressful time for cows as energy demand is very high at a time when cows may struggle to eat enough to supply that demand. It is critical to ensure optimal rumen performance is achieved to meet the energy needs for production and reproduction, while at the same time maintaining body condition. Without a balanced nutrition plan during this critical time, deficiencies in key nutrients can also be an issue, affecting peak production, ongoing lactation, and later, reproductive performance.
It’s not rocket science, nor is it a secret – well-fed cows hold better condition through lactation. Providing the cow has been transitioned well (fed the correct balance of minerals and feeds) she will come into lactation with higher rumen performance and lowered risk of developing metabolic diseases, such as milk fever and ketosis. Superior rumen capacity will enable her to eat a full quota of grass each day, and efficiently convert the nutrients obtained to the energy required to drive higher milk production, while achieving better health outcomes.
Increased milk production causes nutrient demand to increase rapidly. It is important that this demand is met through good quality feed. It is essential that a cow eats as much feed as possible during this time in order to maintain condition, produce milk and drive the hormones required over the coming weeks to become pregnant again.
Ideally, this feed provides the correct levels of quality protein, sugar, fibre, and essential vitamins and minerals. In reality, with most feed production these days focused on quantity instead of quality, a lot of feed provides poor protein, fibre, and mineral levels. The most common mineral deficiencies we see during early lactation are calcium and phosphorus. Both of these minerals are vital for feed intake, conversion, milk production, and maintaining body condition.
MANAGING DCAD LEVELS IN NEW ZEALAND SPRINGER COWS
I recently wrote an article on the unseen impact of milk fever and how widely spread this issue can be without correct mineral support. The challenge of calcium deficiency is a fairly large topic and it’s important to now cover the other key information farmers should consider in managing the pasture dominant diets of our dairy herds at this critical time.
Pasture still makes up a significant portion of the diet for many of New Zealand’s springer cows. Our lush pasture and high growth levels lead to higher than optimal levels of potassium. Levels in the plant can often supply potassium in excess of 300% of a cow’s daily nutritional requirement. High potassium not only restricts the animal’s ability to uptake other essential minerals, it also changes the acid/alkali balance of the body which can seriously impact the body’s ability to release hormones critical to calcium utilisation during calving and early lactation.
The DCAD system of feeding involves adding acid forming salts to the diet of springer cows in an attempt to further drive this metabolic acid/alkali balance slightly more towards the acid range, thus facilitating the release of the hormones required to release calcium. Provided this feeding system is correctly implemented, when compared to other options, this approach is also very cost effective.
CALCIUM OR NO CALCIUM?
The calibration used in the correct formulation of these diets is expressed in total milliequivalents (mEq). An unmodified pasture-based springer cow diet can typically have a DCAD anywhere from +350 to +550 mEq’s or even higher, dependent on the level of pasture being fed. The aim is to get the mEq level of the diet down as low as possible. Under New Zealand conditions that normally means somewhere between -15 to +120 mEq’s. This is achieved by manipulating the feed sources in the diet and then adding a specific blend of acid forming salts. With the correct blend, palatability is maintained while reducing the total feed DCAD levels substantially.