Body Condition Scoring
(Part Two)
Transcript of Select Sires’ Reproductive Moment Program
on DairyLine Radio Which Aired July 13, 2006
With Ray Nebel,
Senior Reproduction and Herd Management Specialist, Select Sires Inc.
Ray, we pick up where we left off last week, talking about body condition scoring in a program for dairy herds. What will a program like this accomplish?
We are really looking for change in body condition; we have what we want to say is ideal. Normally we get an impression: is the herd too thin or over-fleshed? More often than not, today we see herds that are too thin. It is rare that we see a herd that overall too is fat. There are going to be individual animals that are thin or obese, but on the average what we are getting is 75 to 80 percent fit where we would like them to be.
That condition changes with the stage of lactation.
Definitely. We know she is going to lose body condition from calving to breeding; then she should start to replenish her body reserves. Problem breeders, cows we cannot get settled, stay in the herd longer, they get over-fleshed and that is where we see fat dry cows. Fat dry cows really become a problem when we go into the transition because we get fatty livers, we get cows that come down with ketosis and a lot of metabolic disorders. Again, for a cow to be on the thin side is better than being a bit on the obese side.
Would you recommend tracking individual animals?
We really don’t try to track individual animals; we try to track cows at different stages of lactation. For the herd we will probably really be able to get a body condition score for that animal three times during her lactation. Now, we might, but the best thing is we have a scorecard that has the cow’s number on the left hand axis or “Y” axis and on the bottom or “X” axis we have a body condition score. We put the cow’s number and if she scored a 3, 2.5, 3.75; wherever she falls and then at the end of that scoring in that pen you can get an overall shape of where does that pen fall. If it is a fresh cow pen it should be close to a 3.5, if it is a breeding pen it will probably be close to a 2.5, and if it is a late lactation pen it should be close to 3.75. This way we get to that one picture, or snapshot, of all those cows in general where we would like them to be.
Pretty much everyone is using that same type of scoring chart?
It is a pretty standard method of going back and scoring. This is a good way to be able to put it in a three-ring binder, to go back and look at it later and a lot of people write down scores; but scores never get recorded in any kind of system. Some of the DHI systems, Dairy Comp and PCDart allow you to put dairy scores into the system and then we just have to remember to generate reports that tell us fresh cows with, let’s say less than 100 days in milk, what was the average body condition. If we have those reports we can put them in our records system, with these quick and easy recording sheets we don’t have to transpose; we just put it in the notebook and we can simply come back and compare where we are in a few months down the road.
Thanks Ray. Ray Nebel, senior reproduction and herd management specialist with Select Sires.