Milk production and cow behaviour in an automatic milking system with morning and evening pasture access

Abstract

Legislation in Sweden and Norway requires that dairy cattle have outdoor access in summertime. Pasture utilization can be challenging with high yielding cattle and large herd-sizes. Therefore, many farmers choose to offer their cows access to an exercise- and recreation area only, rather than a full production pasture. However, is an exercise paddock as attractive as production pasture for the cow? We compared part-time production and exercise grazing in an automated milking system, with outdoor access in the morning (4.5 h) and the evening (4 h). The production pasture group (P) was offered fresh production pasture daily (≥15 kg dry matter (DM) cow-1) and given a limited silage ration (6 kg DM) night-time. The exercise pasture group (E) was given access to a small exercise paddock (

Keywords

dairy cows; automatic milking; grazing; restricted grazing; supplements

Published in

Grassland Science in Europe
2016, number: 21, pages: 137-139
Title: The multiple roles of grassland in the European bioeconomy. Proceedings of the 26th General Meeting of the European Grassland Federation
Publisher: Norwegian Institute of Bioeconomy Research

Conference

26th General Meeting of the European Grassland Federation

SLU Authors

• Kismul, Haldis

  • Department of Applied Animal Science and Welfare, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    
  • Nord University

• Eriksson, Torsten

  • Department of Applied Animal Science and Welfare, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Spörndly, Eva

  • Department of Applied Animal Science and Welfare, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

UKÄ Subject classification

Animal and Dairy Science

Publication identifier

• eISBN: 978-82-17-01677-9

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/80163