Healthy, fat cows don’t need CIDRs – consultant

 She says it may be one way of cutting costs in a low payout/drought year, but warns often they can’t be cut out straight away; there needs to be a strategy to move towards no CIDRs.

Robinson thinks CIDRs were one of the dairy industry’s most costly mistakes. Used during the 1990s and early 2000s to get anoestrus cows cycling for mating and synchronised mating, they quickly become a tool to make up for the negative effects of low cow condition and underfeeding after calving.  She says it led to years of declining herd fertility and a fall in the genetic ability of cows to get back in calf. Cows that were poor breeders were kept in the herd – and those poor breeding traits were passed on to replacement heifers and bulls bred from those cows.

“We all know the industry fertility target rates: six week in-calf rate 78% and empty rate of under 10%,” said Robinson, a Fonterra-appointed trustee on the Northland Dairy Development Trust at its annual conference. “The question is, can we achieve them without CIDRs? Absolutely, but you must have a plan.”

Robinson, who says she gets negative feedback on her opinions from vets who sell CIDRs, wants to free Northland from CIDRS over the next 10 years. “It will be easier this year because farmers will want to save money.”

She gave examples of three farmers who have gone CIDR free.

The first is NARF (Northland Agricultural Research Farm) which decided to eliminate CIDR use from their herd after regularly treating 25 - 35% of their herd each year.

“They’ve had no change in their six-week in-calf rate and no change in their empty rate. They have just pregnancy tested and have about a 77% 6 wk in-calf rate and 8% MTs. They have 5% of their first calving heifers empty. They are always the ones who used to get ‘CIDRed’. That was a good result.”

Another was a typical southern Northland farm. The farm bought a herd with a widely spread calving and they needed to use CIDRs for the first couple of years to get them back on track. Then they looked for another way. They have gone from using 30% CIDRs seven years ago to none in the last three years. “They have averaged 8% MT and 83% in-calf in 6 weeks.”

Another example is a farm near Whangarei which was following the “recommended plan” from the vets and using 30-50% CIDRs three years ago. They now do not use CIDRs and the empty rate has gone down to 9% and the six-week in-calf rate hasn’t changed at about 75%.

“You can’t just pull the pin, you’ve got to set yourself up for it. There are a number of factors to get right and you have to tick the box on every one of them. But when you do get them right you will succeed.

“All the three farms have focused on big heifers and I would say that’s number one on the list in Northland to achieving CIDR free life,” says Robinson.

“Fat cows at calving: everybody knows about this but we don’t always achieve it.

“The NARF farm focused heavily on the young stock management. They have nice big heifers which cycle well and get in calf when they are in the herd,” says Robinson.

“Just like your calves you need to treat cows as individuals. If one quarter aren’t there, separate out the skinny ones and get them there. Tick the box. 

“Nutrition: some of the three farms found they had fat cows at calving but because of wet springs and genetics in the herd the cows lose too much weight after they calve. They milk too well and lose too much weight. This is more of a problem in Friesians. Some of them use once-a-day as a strategy on young animals and they feed high quality supplements. 

“Weigh your heifers. With crossbred cows these days, if a cow looks like a Friesian it’s probably half Jersey; if it looks like a Jersey it’s probably half Friesian.

“Use genetics weights, it is simple with Minda. Weigh the animals, put the numbers in and the graph tells you which animals are under weight. Separate them out and feed them. If you can’t weigh them, pay someone else to.

“Cow health: lame cows don’t cycle. If they do they don’t show oestrus so you can’t see them. Fix the causes of lameness and also mastitis. Blood test and treat mineral deficiencies.; there are no excuses these days for poor animal health, most things can be treated fairly easily. 

“Calving problems: if you have these, sort out your mating, sort out your bull selection and get your heifers big.

 “Bull numbers… this drives me crazy. You need one bull per 30 cows not in calf, plus spares. I don’t know how often I go to a farm and there are two bulls in a herd and six cows cycling. Do you realise half of those cows are not going to get pregnant today?’ Bulls can only get one to two cows pregnant a day. 

“Count up how many cows are cycling, divide that by 1.5 and that’s how many bulls you should have in there. For 300 cows after five weeks of AB you probably need 7-8 bulls on the farm because you need some spares, you need them resting and rotating. Don’t let them go into the yard if you can help it; they are trainable to stay in the race when you bring the cows in.

“Have them on the farm a month before you need them and all together so they don’t fight when they go into the herd.

“It’s all common sense but so often I don’t see it. Most of this costs  no more money  but can improve your in-calf rate to the bull by 10%.

“Heat detection: be on farm during mating and do the heat detection yourself or have a well trained staff member. Even with all those aids we have, it is such an important, difficult
job; you just have to be there.

“If you have healthy, fat, well-fed cows with everything going for them and they still don’t get in calf – there are whole herds of these out there – then you probably have a genetics problems. A high BW cow that milks well and can’t get in calf is not profitable. So you need to think about not keeping replacements from your poorer breeding cows. Maybe even talk to your breeding company about selecting bulls based on fertility as well. Use well trained AB technicians and have good facilities for them.”

Robinson says she has a 400 cow farm client saving $15,000 a year by not using CIDRs. “He didn’t do anything the rest of you can’t do. It is simple; you’ve just got to tick the boxes and do it.

“The goal is fat, healthy, wealthy cows that can get pregnant without getting a CIDR stuck in them.”