Are
your machines ready to milk fresh cows?
When freshly-calved cows
first come into the shed their teats are no longer soft and supple and
accustomed to being milked. If there was ever a time for taking extra care to
ensure the milking machine is not doing damage, this is it.
It can take a few milkings for
teats to re-acclimatise to the milking machine after calving. During this time,
it is important to keep machine comfort factors high, including keeping the
vacuum strength to a minimum. Things to look for are:
Make sure that teatcup liners
are not nearing the end of their effective life (2500 cow milkings for rubber
liners).
It is NOT good policy to use
older liners that have been “worn in” on heifers. All liners develop very
small cracks over time, even if they are not obvious. These cracks can harbour
bacteria – including the bacteria that cause mastitis.
Make sure that the machine has
been recently serviced. Then you can be confident that the tight, tender teats
of freshly-calved cows are being massaged effectively by pulsation during
milking.
If the test bucket is used at
or below the height of the claw, there is a risk of damaging teat health because
the extra vacuum needed to lift milk into the milk-line will be operating at the
cluster. This issue can be avoided by milking the fresh cows as a separate group
through the normal milking system and diverting the milk from the vat.
Healthy teats rely on the good
operation and use of milking machines. The daily and weekly checks of machine
function listed in the Countdown
Downunder Farm Guidelines for Mastitis Control will alert you to emerging
problems.
Image and caption
There is a risk of damaging
teat health if test buckets are used below the height of the claw in high-line
sheds (Click on photo)
Countdown Downunder Farm Guideline or Technote
Farm Guidelines 6.1, 25
Keywords
milking machines, vacuum, teat end health
Word length
308
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more information on Countdown Downunder