Top 5 tips for February

Joe Patton, Head of Dairy Knowledge Transfer Teagasc, gives his top 5 tips for February

1. Get calves off to the best start – start testing colostrum quality on your farm using a Brix refractometer (>22 = quality colostrum). Follow the 1-2-3 rule – every calf should get three litres of colostrum within the first two hours of life from the first milking.

2. Get your grass year into gear – get cows out to grass for at least three hours per day. Remember slurry is a valuable nutrient source. Apply the correct rate on the correct areas using low-emission slurry spreading (LESS) systems.

3. Get on top of somatic cell count (SCC) issues early – doing a California mastitis test (CMT) on freshly calved cows will identify sub-clinical cows. They can be milked separately (to avoid cross contamination to other cows). Their milk can be excluded from the bulk tank, and their infected quarters should be monitored and treated if Book your first milk recording; it should be within the first 60 days after the start of calving.

4. Control milk fever – ensure a high-quality dry cow mineral continues to be fed at the recommended March/April calvers often cause issues with clinical and sub-clinical milk fever, so manage body condition score (BCS) of these cows to avoid over-conditioned cows.

5. Evening milking time – start as you mean to go on! If you aren’t already doing so, try to start the evening milking between 3.00pm and 4.00pm. There is no reduction in milk by reducing milking interval to 16:8 hours.

This article was published in the Teagasc Dairy Newsletter - February 2023. Download the Full Publication (PDF).