Milk permission for grazing.
When you use a separation gate for grazing or use the milking robot to select the cows to go to the pasture it can be wise to set the Milking Permission slightly lower, so that more cows are milked before going outside. We prefer to do this than blocking cows for example 2 hours before milking permission to go outside, while they are also not allowed to be milked.
Make sure that they have enough milk in their udders for good milking.
Stray currents and Earth rays.
Stray currents are electrical currents that take a different path than the desired circuit.
The damage from stray currents with direct current (for example in the Netherlands and Belgium) is approximately one hundred times greater than that of stray currents when using alternating current.
The explanation must be sought in Lenz’s law, which ensures that conductive loops are kept as small as possible. In other words, the return current always flows close to the associated supply current and provides voltage for the environment.
(Wikipedia) Also think of rolled up power cables that are too long.
When stray current cannot take the desired path, she takes the cow as a path to earth.
A cow does not like that…. She will avoid the place where she experiences that and will not like to come back to that place.
Stray current can occur on all metals, including milking robots, concentrate boxes, drinking troughs, but also, for example, on the (feed) fences in the barn.
It can be due to insufficient grounding, sometimes because certain parts are insufficiently grounded or are insufficiently connected, i.e. voltage differences, to properly grounded parts.
It often helps to couple better or place a (much) larger or deeper earth stake.
But not good grounding can also be caused by damage to power cables, for example due to wear, age, overload, or mice?
Or due to damage to electrical equipment.
When the problem has been solved, the cow will first have to experience that the place is “clean” again. That can take time, but a cow is a herd animal, so if a few cows are normal again, the rest will do the same sooner.
Are you in doubt? Voltage differences are quite easy to measure and you can do this yourself.
Another phenomenon are Earth rays.
Earth rays have never been scientifically proven. Yet many livestock farmers know that cows, and especially horses, often had preferences for certain places in the pasture to lie down. And that didn’t always have to do with a drier place.
Also the experiences of livestock farmers who have started working with (source) correctors. Most experience significant improvements. That may indicate that there are places where animals, but sometimes also people, feel something that makes them not happy to stay in that place.
Increased cell counts are often seen in cows without pathogens being detected in quarter-milk samples.
So the cow’s immune system is in a heightened alarm phase for some reason!?!
A reduced drinking water intake could also be observed when terrestrial radiation flows through the drinking troughs.
You sometimes see that part of the barn is used less than other parts. And sometimes not always. Or that things get much worse in the stable after heavy rainfall, because the water veins transport large amounts of water. Why is this happening?
Underground water veins or impermeable soil or petrified layers or breaks in the layers would ensure that the earth rays cannot leave or take a certain route and are therefore felt by humans and animals and are experienced as very unpleasant.
Also here: Are you in doubt? There are also people here who specialize in this.
Causes of disappointing results should be excluded as much as possible.
Analyze milk production by lactation or lactation stage.
With the results of the milk check you often also receive overviews per lactation number or per lactation stage. These data say a lot about the persistence of your herd, but also about how, for example, the dry period has progressed.
We all know that cows are not allowed to grow or get less condition when they are dry.
If the cows peak too short, this often comes from the dry period, or even from the last month(s) prior to the dry period.
Do heifers do very well or not and the next lactation vice versa, it is very interesting.
Your HMA advisor has lists with which you can read this information with your DelPro data.
Main cleaning, often enough with acid.
After a cow has been milked with an antibiotic treatment, we advise to do a head cleaning.
Especially if this cow is milked just before a scheduled cleaning, this will not cost any extra time, because then the cleaning scheduled for daily times can be skipped.
And does the cleaning take place thoroughly after such a treated cow?
However, it is then cleaned with an alkaline cleaning agent.
And then a planned cleaning with acid might be skipped for a few days!
Make sure that, especially if you do not have very soft water (limescale), sufficient cleaning is done with acid. Usually every 2-3 days.
This can be checked in DelPro by: System => Cleaning Monitoring => Cleaning Overview.
But of course also on the jerry can with acid if it empties too slowly.
Number of days of concentrate build-up or reduction.
When a cow has to be fed more or less concentrate, for example by adjusting the feeding table or simply because she gives more or less milk, it will take a few days to do this, depending on the setting per feed type regarding build-up or reduction.
As long as these days last, she will finish this assignment before accepting a new calculation.
It is good if you also have a column in the list where you check the concentrate dose with how many days the cow is still busy building or breaking down the concentrate which can deviate the most.