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CE L L COUNT
Veterinary Surgeon
Jane Anscombe
XLVets Practice
Farm First Veterinary
Services
W
hen cell counts started to rise at Charles Dowds' New Zealand style
herd in south east Wales, their vet Jane Anscombe from Farm First
Veterinary Services investigated. The changes made since then have
resulted in the bulk milk cell count dropping substantially from 346,000 cells/ml
in February 2010 to an average of 107,000 over the past 7 months.
The 400 cow herd at Cwrt Perrott,
Monmouthshire is managed by David Eldred
who joined the staff in August 2010. Most of
the 400 cows are Jersey x Holstein, and they
calve down annually between February and
April. Yields average 4,500 litres/cow, and
penalties of 0.5ppl are incurred if the bulk
cell count rises above 250,000.
The cell count began to rise at the end of
2009 and individual cow cell counts were
carried out for the first time. Some cows were
given antibiotic dry cow therapy. As the cows
started to calve down in February 2010, the
scale of the problem grew as the bulk milk
cell count rose to 350,000 cells/ml for the
next 3 months.
Robert Smith from Farm First Vets gave some
initial advice on identifying and segregating
high cell count cows. A California Milk Test
(CMT) was used to identify affected quarters
and milk bacteriology from these showed that
Strep. uberis (an environmental pathogen) and
Staph. aureus (a contagious pathogen) were
both causing the high cell counts in this herd.
Monitoring individual cell counts allowed for
targeted treatment of specific animals and
in the worst cases, i.e. repeat offenders,
selective culling was employed.
Jane Anscombe carried out a mastitis advisory
visit at the beginning of April and the findings
were discussed with the team on-farm. The
first area of concern was the management of
the dry cows over winter. In the winter of
2009/10 the dry cows were divided into
three groups - the first group were strip-grazed
on an area which had become poached and
muddy over a hard winter; the second were
kept in a wood-chip corral, the surface of
which had become dirty over the winter; and
the third group were kept in cubicles which
were designed for much bigger cows. These
were not bedded and the backs were
scraped off once daily. All cows were moved
into a straw yard 5-10 days before calving.
The yard was clean and well bedded, but at
times had a very high stocking density, and
was only cleaned out every eight weeks.
David Eldred reports that the management of
the dry cows over the winter of 2010/11
was much improved on the previous year. All
cows were given Orbeseal
TM
and cloxacillin
tubes at drying off. 150 cows were wintered
away, where they were housed in a well
ventilated shed on straw yards. The remainder
were housed in the existing cubicle sheds at
Cwrt Perrott. Gypsum was used on the
cubicle beds, the backs of which were
cleaned off regularly. All passages were
scraped daily and the straw yards were
cleaned out every 5 weeks. Also, as a result
David Eldred and the
Cwrt Perrott herd.
WORKING
TOGETHER
FOR A HEALTHIER FUTURE...
11
LIVESTOCK MATTERS
Attention
to winter
dry cow management
substantially reduces
cell counts