Dairy Sustainability Survey Selective Dry Cow Therapy Study Invitation

The University of California recently published its Golden State Dairy Newsletter, which you can read in its entirety here.

Benchmarking & Describing California Dairy Sustainability Metrics 
A survey invitation will be hitting San Joaquin Valley dairy mailboxes soon! The California Dairy Research Foundation has funded a project to establish baseline energy and water usage on-farm. An additional part of the project will identify the potential for pipeline extension and/or conversion from flush to scrape manure management systems to improve on-farm nitrogen balances. The information gathered will be important to identify opportunities for improved efficiencies now and in the future. This will be the first survey looking at critical sustainability metrics and on-farm management practices in California. It should take less than 10 minutes of your time. You do not need to identify yourself for your answers to be included. Thanks, in advance, for your cooperation in this important area.  

If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to contact us: Deanne Meyer (dmeyer@ucdavis.edujmheguy@ucdavis.edu) or Jennifer Heguy (jmheguy@ucdaivis.edu).

Study Invitation: Impact of Selective Dry Cow Therapy Implementation in California Dairy Farms 
The UC Davis Dairy Health, Reproduction, and Microbiome team invites collaborators to join us in assessing the impact of selective dry cow therapy (SDCT) in California dairy programs. Our focus will be on mastitis incidence and somatic cell count, health, fertility, and cost-effectiveness. Mastitis is the most widespread and costly disease in the dairy industry, leading to an annual loss of $1.7 billion. A large proportion of antibiotics in the sector are used for mastitis prevention as part of blanket dry cow therapy (BDCT) practices. Consequently, recent research explored SDCT programs that use non-antibiotic treatments, such as teat sealants, for cows with lactation SCCs below 200,000 cells/mL, among other criteria. That research indicates SDCT can be effectively implemented on appropriate dairy farms with good udder health.
 
However, the studies evaluating the impact of SDCT have been carried out in European, Canadian, and Midwest US research farms, which face different challenges compared to California. Factors like California’s hot, dry summers, cool, rainy winters, and open dry lot dairies create a unique environment compared to the free-stall barns and other enclosed facilities used in previous SDCT studies. These differences in climate and facilities have been shown to influence the type and incidence of pathogens in dairy herds.
 
Therefore, it is crucial to examine the effects of adopting SDCT in California dairy farms concerning udder health, antimicrobial usage, antimicrobial resistance, and overall dairy farm sustainability. Our main goal is to investigate the influence of dry-off protocols used by California dairies on aspects such as mastitis incidence, SCC, culling, lactation, reproductive performance, and cost-effectiveness.

 
Inclusion study farm criteria: 

• Dairies need to have >1000 cows per herd.
• Actively practicing a variation of selective dry cow therapy or blanket dry cow therapy.
• Either dry lot or free-stall barn housing facilities.

What would the study participants receive in exchange for sharing the information about the dry cow program and data? We will work with your dairy team to learn about the current dry-off program, collect your information and data, perform a comprehensive analysis of your dairy’s milk quality program, and provide guidance on potential aspects to optimize milk quality based on takeaways from the study and current benchmark in the industry. Farms will remain anonymous, and data will not be shared with anyone.

Please contact Tana Almand (tjalmand@ucdavis.edufalima@ucdavis.edu) or Fabio Lima (falima@ucdavis.edu) if you are interested in learning more about the study.