Dairy Science Digest

Colostrum, the life-giving liquid-gold first milk that builds the calves’ immune function. The dairy industry has made amazing strides on colostrum management, however we’ll always have a small number of cows that come in with enough colostrum, just moderate quality. What can we do to enhance the colostrum to ensure the calf’s success?

Dr. Sandra Godden, from the University of MN Vet Med, and her team of researchers sought to better understand what would happen if they directly added dry colostrum replacer to the moderate quality colostrum? Is it better to reconstitute and feed separately? Listen in to learn ways to improve your colostrum program and how to enhance that moderate quality colostrum.

Topics of discussion

1:47 Introduction of Dr. Sandra Godden

2:29 Experimental design and “why” for the project

4:23 Efficiency of absorption

4:55 Abomasal emptying relative to osmolality

7:56 4 treatments

9:52 IgG concentrations at time 0 (Table 3)

10:52 Results discussion - IgG at 24 hours

12:21 General discussion of plasma derived colostrum vs maternal derived replacer

15:05 Discussion of the actual product you used and how it is different from other products on the market

17:45 Impact on health, behavior and appetite for the first 3 days

20:46 Importance of Total Coliform Counts (TCC) in colostrum and how to test

25:26 What do you want Boots on the Ground dairy producers to gain from the project?

26:26 Goals for serum brix readings and serum total protein

Featured Article:

Controlled Field Study Investigating Two Methods of Enriching Moderate-Quality Maternal Colostrum on Transfer of Passive Immunity and Wellbeing of Neonatal Dairy Calves

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