Feeding & Management

Lactation Behavior

The Nederland’s, Commercial Robotic Dairy Farm



Israel, Commercial Dairy Farm



Conclusion:
In general, the Rumination rate at the Dutch farm is higher then the Israeli farm, this indicates more effective fiber and milk components at the Dutch dairy farm.
At the Israeli dairy farm the Rumination rate is lower but milk production is higher, more health and metabolic diseases was reported at the Israeli farm.
Feeding management at the dry period seemed to be better at the Israeli farm.

Weather Influence upon the Rumination Rates



At the top part of the graph we can see the rumination performance of a two nearby dairy farms in Israel, the season is fall and the weather is totally unstable.
From left to right we can see the positive rumination response to the minimum day temperature as it dramatically dropped from 15 to around 8-Celsius degrees.
In general, chewing activity of both farms shows a common movement towards the day minimum temperature, an exception can be seen on the 7th of December 2003 when the rumination rate of farm B suddenly dropped down, this event was eventually combined with a milk reduction and the cause was probably a feeding failure that the dairy farm staff was not aware to.

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