Dixie L. Burris,
Membership Development
CaD ISOO-DHI-TEST for information.
Pemuylvania Dairy Herd Improvement Auodation
DHIA Service Center, Orchard Road, Univenily Park, PA 1(802
C. WILLIAM HEALD
Penn State Professor
Dairy & Animal Science
WILLIAM M. SISCHO
Penn State Assistant Professor
Veterinary Science
STATE COLLEGE (Centre
Co.) Mastitis is the most com
mon and costly disease of dairy
cattle. When mastitis is out of con
trol, it can be stealing up to $2OO
per cow per year out of your
pocket.
How can you tell when you
don’t have mastitis under control?
You need to have at least two
monitors: a record of all clinical
cases of mastitis; and somatic cell
count data, particularly individual
cow data.
More Milk Per Ton of Com !
f 37
|Milk
I r ■*
l^nlmatad
Both of these pieces of informa
tion are essential if you are going
to control mastitis, but for this arti
cle, we are going to concentrate on
somatic cell count data and, in par
ticular, somatic cell score (SCS).
The most common source for
SCS is from the Dairy Herd
Improvement Association
(DHIA). It comes at a cost, and
some dairy producers claim that
they cannot afford it
On an annual basis, the cost of
mastitis may amount to more than
$ll,OOO for a 60-cow herd, or $l6
per cow, per year. In contrast,
DHIA testing for somatic cells is
less than 10 cents per cow per
month. That is an opportunity-to
cost ratio of 160:1. DHIA testing
ds +lBO
+53
2517
3
f^39CT
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|MILK
MILK
. 1174
s 1132
■fat corrected milk (3 5%)
Washington State Trial Data
for somatic cells can pay generous
dividends.
How does one use somatic cell
data to recover these dividends?
Let’s explore this opportunity first
with individual cows, then later
with groups of cows.
Use Of SCS
With Individual Cows
The first step in using your
DHIA SCS information is to find
you herd average SCS and identify
all the cows in the herd with an
SCS greater than 4 (SCS > 4).
Once you have found this infor
mation, you need to answer the fol
lowing questions:
• Is the percentage of cows with
SCS>4 higher this month com
pared to last month?
• Is your herd average SCS grea
ter than 3?
• Do more than 30 percent of
your cows have SCS>4?
If you answer “yes” to any of
these questions, you have a masti
tis problem and you need to make
mastitis control one of you top
priorities.
But where to start?
If you are having problems
maintaining your milk market
because of a high somatic cell
count, you can take some measur
ers to bring it under cotnrol by
using your DHIA information.
MAUD
m
PIONEER
® SM TM ■'trademarks and service marks registered or applied for
of Pioneer Hi-Bnd International Inc All sales are subiect to the terms
of labeling and sale documents © 1995 PHII
tin
■PpV Pioneer
HEs
HBS Source
Lancaster Farming, Saturday, February 11, 1995-A2S
Usually. S percent of the highest
SCS cows can account for 10 to SO
percent of the cells in the bulk
tank. Identify the cows with the
highest SCS and look at their per
centage contribution to the tank.
Segregation of the milk from these
cows from the bulk tank can bring
your herd average SCS well within
legal limits.
When practical, the removal of
these cows from the herd will
reduce the spread Of contagious
mastitis from these infected cows
to clean cows. This measure will
do much to keep future SCS low, if
appropriate mastitis control mea
sures are used.
Identify cows with SCS>S
(severely infected), those with an
How Does Your Herd Compare?
STATE COLLEGE (Centre Co.) —These data are calculated using
information pulled from Pennsylvania DHIA’s mainframe computer
each week. It is a one-week summary representing approximately one
fourth of the herds on test, as they are tested monthly.
These data are valuable from a business management standpoint and
can be used for comparing your operations to the averages from about
one-fourth of the herds across the state.
DHIA Averages for all herds processed between 1/22/95 and 1/29/93
SCS>4 for two consecutive
months (chronically infected), and
those with an SCS that for the first
time is between between 4 and 5
(mildly infected).
These cows are important,
because they represent significant
loss of milk to your bulk tank. The
milk loss per cow per month is esti
mated as 45 pounds for each SCS
greater than 2.
As an example, if the SCS for a
cow is 8, then milk loss can be cal
culated as: 8 minus 2 equals 6.
Six times 45 equals 270 pounds
of milk loss for this cow on this
month. This can represent a loss of
$32.40 for the lost milk
production.
Number of Herds Processed
Number of Cows Processed
Number of Cows Per Herd
Milk Per Cow (Lbs)
%-Fat
Fat Per Cow (Lbs)
%-Protein
Protein Per Cow (Lbs)
Average Days in Milk Per Cow
•Value for CWT Milk(s)
•Value for CWT Grain(s)
•Value for CWT Hay(S)
•Value for CWT Silage(s)
•Value for Pasture Per Day(s)
•Value for Milk Per Cow Per
Year(s)
•Feed Consumed Per Cow Per
Year(Lbs)
A: Grain
B; Hay
C: Silage
D: Day Pasture
♦Feed Cost Per Cow Per Year(s)
A: Grain
B: Hay
C: Silage
D: Pasture
•Total Feed Cost Per Cow Per
Ycar(s)
♦lncome Over Feed Costs Per
Year(s)
♦Grain to Milk Ratio
•Feed Cost Per CWT Milk(s)
Avg Level For 871 SCC Herds
♦Mwfcf gwralad Ogww
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including long stem dry hay and other tough roughages that
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MILLCREEK farmPsystems
2285 Old Philadelphia Pike
Lancaster, PA.17602 (717) 396-8987
(Turn to Page A2B)
946
59,714
63.1
18,600
3.70
689
3.21
597
318
13.11
7.88
4.29
1.54
.27
2,440
7,373
2,102
15,294
63
1,515
1:2.5
4.97
344.952
581
90
235
17
924