Testimonial – Gareth Hale, Timaru
The prospect of facing at least 20 down cows every day over calving is the stuff of nightmares for most dairy farmers. But for Gareth Hales and his team this was often the reality. With was the stressful, time consuming and expensive issue of getting those cows back on their feet, and into the herd again. […]
Sollus a solution on tough milking country
Testimonial – Craig Vanner, Mangakino
Farming on the tough volcanic country around Mangakino means Craig Vanner has learned to tailor his expectations to the limitations of the land. This includes dealing with some tough winters with low growth days and a tendency for the lighter soils to turn dry easily from early summertime.
But for Craig his two biggest issues that had added to the farm’s challenges have been high incidence of milk fever in his 500 head herd over spring-time, and problems getting them back in calf. […]
More than minerals with Sollus support
Testimonial – Hamish Johnston, Timaru
When Hamish Johnston started discussing his herd health problems with Sollus he soon found he was getting more than just the opportunity to buy some minerals to deal with the problem. “When Sollus first rang me and we started talking I soon found we were getting a company that understood animal nutrition very well and was not interested in just selling us some product.” […]
Getting the balance right
Testimonial – Bryan Holmes, Matamata
Making his farm system more “cow-centric” and basing his feeding system to his herd’s needs has started to pay dividends for Matamata farmer Bryan Holmes.
Bryan’s 720 head herd is split 50:50 between spring and autumn calving but one problem has underscored the past years’ calving is having to grapple with milk fever at levels that were becoming unmanageable […]
When is the best time to dry off?
“For the vast majority of New Zealand dairy herds it is dry off time, or at least rapidly approaching…” […]
Down cows, no longer a fact of dairy life
“Death, taxes and down cows do not all have to be certainties in a dairy farmer’s life.
As dairy farmers you do not have to accept that this is a reality, and by changing your focus on farm from treating sick animals to prevention you can remove one of the ‘certainties’ from the list, making dairying more enjoyable and more profitable.” […]
Efficiency = Profitability
“This energy loss results in lots of the negatives associated with the larger cows, including negative energy balance, poor fertility and even ketosis. Furthermore, the genetic potential of the Holstein Friesians means that we cannot supply this energy requirement and this often manifests itself in low BCS.” […]
Herd health determined by metabolic status
“While Dairy NZ has done an excellent job of explaining the use and benefit of magnesium before calving, many farmers still have questions about their cows’ health at farming. There are some interesting things to be considered in this space.” […]
Metabolics a precursor to herd diseases
“We know that herds with high incidence of metabolics have poor health, but is it really related? In fact, published research has shown that milk fever, clinical or sub clinical, directly increases the incidence of many diseases.” […]
Video – Tranzsol User Andrew Parker Interview
Andrew Parker, farmer of 850 milking cows in South Waikato talks about the benefits of Transzol. […]