At this time of year work load increases as animal are housed. It is very important to keep ahead of any potential issues that occur during the winter.
5 point plan for December
- Animal Health
- Vaccinate where appropriate to prevent issues later during the calving season.
- Follow appropriate dry cow therapy.
- Monitor cows regularly to assess for dry cow mastitis.
- Ensure all stock are dosed for fluke, worms and lice.
- Good ventilation, water and adequate social space are so important.
- Dry off cows in poor condition to allow time to recover.
- Footbath regularly to prevent mortellaro.
- Feed Budgeting
- Nutrition Plan
- Once you know the quality and quantity of fodder available speak to your nutritionist to formulate balanced diets.
- Ensure feed is fed fresh daily and rejected feeds are passed to lower demanding stock.
- When using your Abbey Feeder load the ingredients in the correct order (e.g. long fibre first) and mix for the correct length of time to avoid over processing.
- Do a maintenance check on the Abbey Feeder (oil levels, grease appropriately, PTO’s in good working order, full complement of sharp blades etc). Refer to your operations manual.
- High fibre diets (with appropriate protein and energy) suit the dry cow period.
- Stock Management
- Monitor performance (weigh batches monthly to see if on target)
- Walk through stock daily to ensure all are healthy.
- Get your vet to assess stock at various points during the feeding season.
- Condition score stock and feed appropriately.
- Monitor cow signals
- Cow gait while walking.
- Numbers lying down and chewing cud (should be 70% at any given time).
- Cow manure structure tells if animal’s digestive performance is going to plan.
- Rumen fill tells if animals are healthy and if they are being fed adequately.