Teat Score to Reduce Mastitis
Along with financial incentives to produce higher quality milk, there is a new reason to improve milk quality and that is animal efficiency. Less mastitis means more efficient cows so there is a reduction in on-farm emissions intensity, meeting the expectations of our global dairy customers.
All mastitis infections start with bacteria entering the teat, causing infection and inflammation. The aim of mastitis control is to limit the number of bacteria on the cow’s teats and to reduce the risk of bacteria entering the udder through the teat canal. Although this sounds simple, mastitis is the end result of complex interactions between the cow, bacteria, environment, milking machine and the farmer. The relative importance of these factors varies from farm to farm so it is important that your plan is specific to your farm.
The obvious question is: where do we start? Well, the great news is that the answer is right in front of us – by assessing and scoring the teat-skin and teat-ends of 50 cows in the herd in early, mid and late lactation.
Here’s a great real-life example;
When this herd with high BMSCC were teat-scored in late December, 46% of the cows had dry teats (target <10%) and 38% of cows had one or more rough teat ends (target <20%).
The solution was to increase the emollient in the teat spray and improve teat spray coverage. Within a month the number of dry teats had decreased to 20% and the BMSCC was on its way down. Teat -ends take longer to heal but with the changes made to teat spraying, they will improve by the next lactation. If the herd had been teat scored earlier in the season the changes could have been made sooner and the farm could have achieved the milk quality premiums they were aiming for.
By teat scoring the cows 2 times over the season you can monitor what’s going on during the milking process and identify the critical mastitis issues on your farm to make change before it’s too late. The end result is more milk of higher quality and more efficient cows.
