What does spring mean to you? Longer days, more sunlight, flowers blooming, planting time, or a favorite of many producers: Letting the cows out onto fresh green grass after a long winter indoors?
For cows, it means the start of higher colostrum production.
According to a 2022 Michigan State University study, researchers recorded the following average first-milking, per-head colostrum output per season from three commercial Michigan herds:
- Winter (4.5 quarts)
- Spring (5.7 quarts)
- Summer (6.2 quarts)
- Fall (5.7 quarts)
Washington State University researchers confirmed that May and June have the highest colostrum production and December has the lowest.
Maureen Hanson, author of the Dairy Herd Management article Fall Brings Low Tide for Colostrum Output, turned to experts for answers. Our Protekta dairy nutritionist Rod Martin shared his insights and offered some nutritional and management measures to support higher colostrum production. “Dial into pre-fresh nutrition by examining the factors that affect dry-matter intake like bunk management, particle size, moisture, and forage fermentation consistency,” said Rod. He also noted, “The popularity of adding bulk to pre-fresh rations via straw and grass hay may lead to a higher incidence of ration sorting and introduce antagonists that interfere with the hormonal changes required for colostrum synthesis.”
Read the Dairy Herd Management article for more details and also check out another blog on this topic that Rod wrote back in November 2023, Low Colostrum Production: Lots of Questions…Not as Many Answers. There he provides on-farm checkpoints to review when colostrum production is challenged.
