Heifer rearing is one of the biggest expenses on a dairy farm and with increasing prices for milk replacer, feed and buildings in recent years this cost has only gone up. The return on investment doesn’t start until a heifer calves in at two years of age, and most farms will not make any profit […]
Tag Archives: Heifer
How are your heifers performing?
Vets Guide to Liver Fluke
Now’s the time to monitor the impact of liver fluke in your herd Liver fluke (fasciolosis) is a parasitic disease that affects grazing animals, particularly those grazed on wet and muddy pastures near rivers or ponds. The life cycle requires mud snails as an intermediate host, and warm summers with heavy rainfall, such as this […]
October – News From Our Rounds
NORTH – James Aitken It is now three months since the clients of Orchard Vets in Glastonbury moved over to Synergy, and likewise three months since I joined the Synergy team. As a traditional mixed practice Orchard had been finding it increasingly difficult to provide a gold standard service to the vastly different clients and […]
Reflection on the Year from the 0-6 Youngstock Advisory Team
It has been another busy year for the 0-6 Youngstock Advisory Team! Ellen and Martijn ran our very first ‘Youngstock Foundation course’, a day-course for those new to calf rearing or wanting a refresher. We will continue to run this course every 6 months. We hosted some well attended meetings on pre-weaning nutrition and calf […]
Cattle Freeze Branding
Recently I have been developing my skills in Freeze branding. Here I share a few thoughts on the process and some key facts which help explain the method we use to provide permanent ID on cattle. Freeze branding uses copper alloy irons chilled in a solution of dry ice (frozen C02) and an alcohol solution […]
Vaccination Time for Cattle
For most, Spring is the busiest time of the year. Traditionally herds would vaccinate their cows before turnout, but all year round housed cattle tend to have the majority of vaccine now as well. It is important an individual vaccination programme is in place for your farm so that not only the correct timing, dose […]
Seven steps for a better service period
By the time you read this newsletter, spring calving will be well under way – for some of you perhaps already over! I appreciate there are a hundred and one tasks to carry out following calving, from ear tagging to turnout. But to ensure a smooth service period, resulting in an improved calving next year, […]