Understanding the Dairy Cow

John Webster

• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781119550228
• eBook ISBN: 9781119550242
• Edition: 3
• Topic: Medicine
• Subtopic: Veterinary Medicine

A comprehensive and thoroughly revised text on dairy science that contains information on the most recent developments

The fully updated third edition of Understanding the Dairy Cow explores the scientific principles that provide a foundation for understanding the animal's body system. The comprehensive text also reveals how to properly manage dairy cattle with economic efficiency whilst taking into consideration the cow's welfare.

The revised new edition contains expanded coverage on topics including insight into cow behaviour and welfare, genetic selection indices, new strategies for control of mastitis and lameness and information on the overworked cow. It also contains the most recent developments in breeding, nutrition and management.

• Is an authoritative text on the dairy cow that covers a wide-ranging subject area including the science, disease and husbandry
• Presents the information and knowledge necessary for the efficient and humane management of cows
• Includes expanded coverage on a variety of topics such as cow behaviour and welfare, and genetic selection indices
• Highlights major new developments in the field

Covering both the basics and recent developments in dairy science, Understanding the Dairy Cow 3^rd Edition is ideal for students in agriculture and veterinary science and for professionals working in the complex business of dairy farming.

Part I
How the Cow Works

1
Introduction – The Dairy Cow of Today

Understanding the dairy cow is a matter of heart and mind. We need to consider her scientifically as a complex and elegant biological instrument to provide us with milk, the nearest thing in nature to a complete food. Equally, we need to recognise her as a sentient (and highly engaging) creature who deserves a reasonable quality of life and, at the end, a gentle death. In both senses of the word this understanding is not static. The more we study the workings of the dairy cow, the more we can exploit her capacity to produce food for human consumption from milk, butter, yoghurt and a dazzling variety of cheeses. The more we study her health, behavioural and environmental requirements, the better we can ensure her welfare.

The cow was one of the first animals to be domesticated for human use and has come a very long way since then. The traditional role of the family cow was to provide milk, work, fertiliser, fuel, clothing and the occasional fatted calf, while sustained by fibrous feeds that the family could not digest for themselves, usually from land that the family did not own. The modern dairy cow, typified by the Holstein breed, is a very different creature: bred, fed and managed to produce as much milk as possible within intensive, highly mechanised dairy units. Meat production has become a relatively minor consideration, with calves destined for beef or veal sent, more often than not, off farm to other specialist rearing units. Other roles for the milch cow have disappeared altogether. The modern Holstein is most unlikely to be harnessed to a plough! Most of this change has taken place in the last 80 years since the industrialisation and mechanisation of agriculture made it more convenient to bring the feed to the cows than expect them to forage for themselves on a year‐round basis. This has had a profound effect on the types of cow that we have bred to suit our current purpose. Consider the four pictures in Figure 1.1. All illustrate top quality cows from breeds in use today. The Dairy Shorthorn (Figure 1.1a), now something of a rare breed, has the traditional, functional shape of a dual‐purpose cow bred to produce milk and beef, primarily from grazed and conserved pasture. In the second half of the 20th Century this breed was largely replaced in the UK by the British Friesian (Figure 1.1b), which, when managed essentially within a pastoral system but given more concentrate, was able to produce more income from the sale of milk (with beef as a good secondary enterprise). The two cows are rather similar in appearance (phenotype). Both have deep bodies, containing a large rumen able to digest large quantities of forage. Both also carry a substantial amount of muscle (and fat when well fed) which enables them to sustain health and production at times when the quantity and quality of feed may be in relatively short supply. This trait is, obviously, consistent with the potential to produce good beef. These two breeds may be said to be at the dairy‐type end of dual‐purpose (milk and beef) cows.

Figure 1.1 Shapes of dairy cows. (a) Dairy Shorthorn, (b) British Friesian, (c) American Holstein, (d) Jersey.

The modern Holstein, however, is a very different creature (Figure 1.1c). Not only does she have a conspicuously larger udder, she is bigger framed, much more rhomboid in shape and carries much less muscle. This phenotype is the consequence of a breeding policy designed to ensure the production of as much milk as possible from individual cows spending most of their adult life in barns on a diet of rich feed. The fourth picture is of a Jersey cow (Figure 1.1d), much smaller and daintier than the Holstein, but essentially similar in shape and conformation. These breeds are both examples of the extreme dairy type.

This book will explore our understanding of the physiology, behaviour, feeding and breeding of the modern dairy cow mostly within the context of specialist, intensive systems of dairy production. There are several good textbooks on dairy farming (see section on Further Reading) and the information given in these is constantly augmented and brought up to date by booklets from the advisory services: in the UK, the Agricultural Development and Advisory Service (ADAS), the Milk Marketing Board (MMB) and a number of private enterprises (e.g. GENUS, etc.). This book is not intended to compete with these excellent sources of information but to complement them. It is intended for those who wish to enrich their concern for the dairy cow with better understanding based on sound evidence. It is primarily addressed to students in agriculture and veterinary science but will, I hope, be of interest and value to farmers, stockpersons (herders), those supporting the dairy industry as feed advisors and in other agricultural support trades; also for those with no direct contact with the dairy industry but that have real concerns for the welfare of farm animals and the environment.

If we wish to achieve this better understanding, we have no option but to take a deep breath and plunge into the principles of nutrition, physiology, genetics, animal health and behaviour. This poses a different set of problems. Most textbooks and scientific papers that deal with the workings of the cow, i.e. the physiology of digestion, reproduction, lactation etc. are written by scientists (such as myself) who have spent most or all their working lives in academic research. They tend to carry a degree of complexity that may be necessary for those directly involved in agriculture or veterinary science, but which are prone to tell the farmer, student or advisor rather more than they actually want (or need) to know. Publications of this sort that are full of information important to the fundamental scientist may provoke from the farmer, non‐specialist student or concerned member of the general public, the question ‘gee whiz, but so what?’. They are of interest to the microbiologist, for example to identify the thousands of species of microorganisms that inhabit the rumen and fundamental information of this sort has undoubtedly contributed much to (e.g.) the development of feed additives, and current efforts to restrict production of methane, a significant contributor to climate change. Similarly, they are of interest to the reproductive physiologist to investigate in ever greater depth the cascade of hormones that regulate sexual function and such research has led to major innovations in the practical control of reproduction. However, knowing the names and specific biochemistry of the individual microorganisms in the rumen, or all the specific hormones involved in reproduction, is not really of much practical use to the dairy farmer. My aim in this book is therefore to concentrate on those aspects of cow function in health and disease that are of economic or welfare importa...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Preface to the Third Edition
• About the Companion Website
• Part I: How the Cow Works
• Part II: Feeding the Dairy Cow
• Part III: Housing Health and Management
• Part IV: Breeding and Fertility
• Part V: Cows, People and the Environment
• Further Reading
• Index
• End User License Agreement