Mastitis inflames and causes pain in a cow’s udder, reducing milk quality and saleable yield.
Mastitis in dairy cattle is typically caused by bacterial infections, which can be categorised into environmental and contagious groups. Environmental bacteria originate from outside the milking parlour, while contagious bacteria spread mainly during milking. Identifying the specific bacteria responsible for mastitis on your farm helps pinpoint key risk factors and informs appropriate control measures.
Effective control is crucial for cow welfare and reducing costs.
Prevention
Preventing new infections is key. Focus on protecting cows from environmental sources and other infected cows.
Key strategies include:
- Ensuring a clean calving environment.
- Implementing fly control.
- Providing adequate nutrition.
Monitoring and early detection
Early detection and treatment of mastitis are vital:
- Perform a California Mastitis Test (CMT) on heifers with high cell counts.
- Regularly check heifers pre- and post-calving.
- Avoid over- and under-milking.
Summer Mastitis
For summer mastitis:
- Strip the affected quarter regularly.
- Use intramammary antibiotics and anti-inflammatory injections.
- Isolate affected animals.
- Implement early and effective fly control.
Antibiotic use
Antibiotics for existing mastitis should be a short-term solution. Long-term success relies on improved herd management and prevention strategies.
Dry cow therapy can treat existing infections before calving but should not be used for control due to variable infection pressures and long withdrawal periods.
Injectable antibiotics should not be used for mastitis control prior to calving.
Fly control
Control flies early with pour-on or spot-on treatments, fly ear tags, and repellents.
Aim to start treatments before the fly season begins.
Cross-suckling
Prevent cross-suckling to avoid spreading infections.
Feed milk replacer or pasteurised milk to avoid antibiotic residues and diseases like Johne’s.
Internal teat sealants
Use internal teat sealants for heifers at high risk of infection. This creates a barrier to prevent bacteria from entering the teat canal. Follow strict hygiene practices to avoid introducing infections.
Milk Insights by Herdwatch
Herdwatch allows you to identify your cows individual performance through the milk performance module. This module allows you to identify any potential health problems within your herd on a case by case basis from your pocket. Reduced milk yield, quality and increased somatic cell counts (SCC), are all potential warning signs of mastitis.
> Tap on Performance.
> Tap on Milk Recordings.
> Tap on Per Cow.
‘Per Cow’ breaks down the information on an individual basis for each animal. All relevant headings from your milk recording are covered. This section also can be filtered down if you want to search for specific animals milk recording . Using the magnifying glass in top right hand corner it also gives you the option to filter:
- The date of the milk recording.
- Calving date.
- Days in milk.
- Milk KG.
- Milk Solids.
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