High milk production and animal health must go hand in hand
De Wetschothoeve in Vlimmeren, Belgium, is managed by Bart Jochems and his family. Bart is the third generation farmer on the dairy farm, which has not always operated entirely as a dairy farm. At the current location, his grandparents once started a farm with more horticulture than agriculture. Among other things, pickles and strawberries were grown and there company kept chickens, pigs and cows. When Bart’s father took over the business in 1976, he chose to focus on the dairy branch. In 2000, it was Bart’s turn to take over the farm from his father, at which time the farm had around 70 cows. Since then, many changes have been made on the farm, including its approach to animal health. Curious what changes the farm has gone through and how they have tackled challenges? We will tell you in this article.
Ambition for higher production levels
Since Bart took over the farm, the number of cows has gradually increased significantly and the farm currently has 280 cows with accompanying young stock, 95% of which are Holstein. Bart’s father was always heavily involved in breeding and once started with cow that produced 7,500 Liters. Over the years, production has also evolved and the cows now produce about 10,000 Liters. In the number of cows, the farm can no longer grow, so now it comes down to the cows going up in production. For this, Bart still has plenty of ambitions; his wish is to start milking towards 13, 14 of even 15,000 Liters. To making milking efficient, they had four Merlin Fullwood Packo milking robots installed at the beginning of this year, which have worked well so far.
Need for alternative to traditional methods was great
When an AHV Farm Advisor first visited the farm, Bart was not at all convinced by the story. Sometime later, a fellow neighbouring farmers said to him: “Those products work well, you should try that!”. “At that time, we has some problems, for example our udder health was not the best and we were at our wits’ end”, Bart says. “We didn’t really believe in AHV in the beginning, but we were so fed up with all those traditional methods that we thought, we’re going to give that a shot. We started following the protocols and now we are three years on.” The guidance of the company’s regular AHV Farm Advisor Stella Faber, is also of great value. “Stella puts in a lot of work to achieve good results, we are very satisfied with that!” She visits the farm every six weeks to look at the health status and production levels of the cows. In addition to this proactive advice, there is also reactive advice for any product applications to the animals.
The dairy farmer’s, Arla’s and AHV’s vision aligned
Besides udder health, products from the AHV Transition and Uterine Health & Fertility Program are also implemented on this farm. Around calving, Metri Tablet, StartLac Paste and Booster Tablet are used. The AHV Uterine Health & Fertility Program aim to improve uterine health and fertility, promote optimal; calving, a strong stat to lactation and increased lifetime productivity.
The milk from the cows is supplied to Arla, where Bart is also on the board, for ten years already. At Arla, both sustainability and the use of traditional methods are important aspects, AHV’s vision fits in well with this. They also pay out a quality percentage based on the tank cell count. Bart says that because Arla is very responsive to this, as a farmer you are also much more conscious of matters such as sustainability and Bart thinks this is a good thing. On the farm, the use of traditional methods is very low In terms of udder health. Less than 30 percent of the cows are put dry with the use of regular means. “Using AHV saves traditional methods, the Metri Tablet really contributes to this. In the area of uterine health, we used to use more traditional methods.”
Udder health is now under control
The way of working with the AHV products has also changed over time on the farm. “In the beginning it was mainly solving problems rather than preventing things, and now we have actually reached the point where things are just running well. The tank cell count is good, there are not many udder health problems, we feel it is under control now.” Whereas udder health has been causing serious problems for some time, the other cow health aspects have actually been stable at the farm. “Now, when I see suspicions in terms of udder health, I tackle it intensively right away. In these cases, I then give a cow a Quick, Extra and Aspi Tablet, and often also a Booster Tablet with it to support the cows optimally.”
Difficult start to lactation? Administering a Booster Tablet
Besides providing udder health support, Booster Tablet is used more widely on the dairy farm. Once every few days, the fresh cows are checked to see how they are starting up, and if it is noticed that a cow is having a somewhat difficult start, a Booster Tablet is provided. “I think the product definitely does its job, we also provide it in case of a too low rumen pH,” says Stella. Stella further explains, “Booster is often used in cases of lagging production, changes in manure, reduced rumen filling and reduced appetite. By using the Booster Tablet, you can see that a cow starts eating again within a few days and so the other health problems also improve.”
“The capacity of the milking robot is now optimally used with AHV”
In the beginning, Bart had to get used to the new way of working, especially that it sometimes took longer before visible results were seen. He now knows that it works and how long it should take to see the effect. “it is not more expensive than the traditional methods I have used before, I like the ease of working and I am convinced that if you follow the protocols you will see the tank cell count drop. You end up having to use less and less reactive products, which makes it a bit more economical. What I found an advantage of the products of AHV, especially when we were still milking in a parlour and with staff, is that AHV’s products can be implemented safely, compared to traditional methods. Now, with the robots, I actually find it even easier. When you provide an AHV product to a cow, you do have to keep an eye on her, but you no longer have to crawl under her because you no longer have the milking parlour, which I think is very big advantage. When milking after administering traditional methods, the milking robot has to be flushed after every milking, and this takes a few minutes. If that cow comes through the robot three times for milking, you might have lost 24 minutes. With 280 cows, a quick calculation shows that it is just simply impractical. With AHV, you just do a backflush and it offers you the opportunity to do not lose any time and make the best of the robot’s capacity.”
Wishes for the future
When it comes to fertility, Bart still sees opportunities to improve this and it is something they are working on intensively. He explains that the two focus areas of this farm have actually always been nutrition and fertility. Yet it was sometimes difficult to keep an overview when it came to fertility, but there is now a new way of working on the farm. The farm now has a fertility supervisor that visits the farm every Tuesday and checks about 20 to 30 cows. These cows are checked around 30 days after calving and it is noticeable that very few cows are dirty, which is positive for cow fertility. With this approach and the support of AHV products, Bart is confident that this health aspect is too will be taken to the next level.
About the dairy farm
At Wetschothoeve in Vlimmeren there are 280 dairy cows with accompanying young stock. The cows are milked with 4 Merlin Fullwood Packo milking robots with the cows currently having an average milk yield of 10,000 litres. The average fat percentage is 4.28% and 3.65% protein.
These products are used at the Wetschothoeve:
AHV Quick Tablet
AHV Extra Tablet
AHV Aspi
AHV Metri Tablet
AHV StartLac
AHV Booster
Have a question?
Would you like to be visited by an advisor to discuss the health challenges on your farm together? Our AHV Farm Advisors will be happy to visit you to jointly assess the health of your cows and come up with appropriate cow-specific advice.
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