On a farm visit today in county Cork with a dairy herd of 60 cows. Body condition score of cows was extremely poor and in addition the cows were extremely loose with a high passage rate of faeces. The farmer agreed with me that this was the case for the past 3 weeks when the cows went back out on grass from silage harvested previously. This type of aftergrass with a high uptake of nutrients after a dry period in May-June. In this situation, more fibre is needed in the diet to reduce passage rates.
Dr Dan Ryan
www.cows365.com