Lactanet is offering dairy producers a chance to benchmark themselves against other operations through a free winter webinar series.
A six-year “extensive data-mining initiative” using the organization’s DairyComp herd management software and dozens of dairy farms is the heart of the initiative.
The first program tackled dry-period duration, ketosis testing and more.
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WHY IT MATTERS: As the amount of data collected on dairy farms steadily rises, farmers and service providers are challenged to make use of it.
The online invitation sent out for the series said the aim is “to uncover detailed annual production and reproduction benchmarks to provide valuable insights for today’s most practical dairy herd management questions.” Sessions were held Jan. 29 and Feb. 12.
“Drawing from the Lactanet processing centre and more than 2,000 DairyComp data files from herds across Canada, this project offers an unprecedented perspective into herd performance,” said the invitation.
The organization’s senior DairyComp product specialist Jeromy Ten Hag led the inaugural session, kicking it off with an exploration of dry period durations.
Turning information into action
- Data overload: As farms collect more digital information, the primary challenge for producers is translating raw data into practical management decisions.
- Unprecedented scope: Drawing from over 2,000 DairyComp files, this initiative provides a rare, wide-scale look at how Canadian herds are actually performing.
- Health and recovery: Proper benchmarking prevents “observational” errors, ensuring cows have enough time for udder tissue repair without becoming over-conditioned.
- Economic impact: Even minor deviations from ideal dry periods or ketosis thresholds result in measurable losses in milk fat and peak yields.
Cautioning that the DairyComp data can only be treated as “observational” rather than representing solid findings, he noted that multiple researchers have determined that dry periods that are too short can lead to adverse effects on udder health — mainly due to insufficient time for udder tissues to fully repair after a months-long previous lactation.
But typically, when dairy specialists think about dry periods, they’re concerned about excess duration resulting in cows being over-conditioned when they freshen. When cows draw on energy reserves to maintain heavier weight, this can lead to a greater risk of early-lactation metabolic disorders and longer recovery periods following calving.
“All of these things are negative, and it certainly takes time to manage those types of things,” said Ten Hag.
Tightening up
The trend over the past five years, according to the data mining project, has been fewer and fewer Canadian cows with dry periods on both the upper and lower ends of the spectrum — those less than 45 days and those greater than 75 days.
Focusing for the past two years on 305-day milk yield as it relates to dry periods, Ten Hag said the data mining team observed the highest yield for the 45-75 day dry period group. There was a more significant decrease in milk yield among cows experiencing shorter dry periods compared to those with dry periods longer than what’s considered optimum.
Ten Hag described this as somewhat surprising, given that more attention has been paid over the years by dairy specialists to avoiding long dry periods, and less attention paid to short dry periods.
Data for 305-day fat yield followed a similar pattern, as did the data for peak milk.
“We’re losing about 3.5 kilograms at peak (of the cow’s lactation) if the dry periods are shorter (than ideal); and we’re losing between one to two kilograms at peak if the dry periods are longer (than ideal).”
Managing ketosis
Next on Ten Hag’s agenda was DairyComp’s monitoring of sub-clinical ketosis across Canada. In this case, there have been some definite regional divergences over the past few years.
“I think we can agree that ketosis can be bad … (and) can be associated with poor outcomes in health, production and fertility,” he said, adding it’s also true not all cows testing high for ketosis risk will be problematic.
He described Lactanet’s Ketolab test — which customers must choose to include among their milk test offerings — as “wildly convenient,” but noted “it’s meant to be a herd screen or a herd monitoring tool. … We can’t find every sick animal on the farm because we’re not there often enough.”
Producers should start considering a strategy to combat clinical and subclinical ketosis when 20 per cent of their cows between 5-21 days in milk are testing positive.
Lactanet’s data shows that, since 2021, there has been a steady decline in positive tests in Quebec herds. Approximately 15 per cent of the cows on test in the province are now turning up positive in Ketolab.
Impact of management decisions on herd performance
Category
Dry period <45 days
Dry period >75 days
Ontario ketosis
Quebec ketosis
Large herds 300+
Finding/regional trend
Becoming less common
Becoming less common
Steady increase
Steady decline
Better control protocols
Production impact
-3.5kg at peak milk yield
-1 to -2kg at peak milk yield
Above 20% threshold
Below threshold (~15%)
Below 20% threshold
Key takeaway: While the industry is “tightening up” dry periods to the 45-75 day sweet spot, Ontario faces a growing challenge with sub-clinical ketosis, especially in robotic milking systems.
By contrast, since 2022 in Ontario, there has been a steady increase in positive tests. The province’s herd is now “significantly above that threshold of 20 per cent,” Ten Hag said.
First-lactation cows are below the threshold in all regions of Canada. Ontario has second-lactation cows above the threshold, but all other regions are below. And in lactation three and over, most of the country is above the 20 per cent threshold.
Robotic herds in Ontario are averaging close to 35 per cent testing positive in Ketolab results. By herd size, all sizes except 300 head and greater in Ontario are above the 20 per cent threshold.
“Perhaps it’s protocol-driven, or maybe it’s feed-driven. But for whatever reason, those larger herds are doing a better job at keeping this under control.”
Other topics tackled in the Jan. 29 webinar were udder health in early-lactation cows and reasons why early-lactation cows are being culled or leaving the herd.
