Reducing concentrate feeding in organic dairy cows with the help of body condition-monitoring

Summary

Starting in 2022 it will be mandatory for Swiss organic farms to feed no more than 5% of concentrates in yearly rations to ruminants; so to put the ‘feed no food’-strategy into effect. It will be a challenge to feed high yielding dairy cows adequately. In the frame of two term papers we tested on two commercial farms whether it would be a suitable method to reduce or to cease concentrate feeding as soon as cows stop mobilising body fat. In 2020 we observed milk production- and body condition (BCS) development after 100%-concentrates reduction (12 Swiss Fleckvieh (SF) and 2 Red Holstein (RH) cows, first lactation) or 50%-reduction (6 multiparous RH cows). Amounts of concentrates were compared to the (fictive) amounts of concentrates that would have been fed in 2020 if the former feeding regime (concentrate amounts according to daily milk yield) would have been used. And we compared milk yields of each cow in 2019 and 2020. In average 35% less concentrates were fed per animal than would have been fed with the former feeding regimes. Average yearly concentrate amounts per cow were reduced from 123 kg to 64 kg and from 348 to 260 kg in SF and RH cows, respectively. 76% of the study animals showed a higher milk production in 2020 than in 2019, in 52% also milk fat content was higher and in 52% milk protein content was higher. 75% of the study animals did not reduce milk production after concentrates had been reduced in their ration. 25% did reduce milk production and 25% started to mobilize body fat again. 40% of the cows did not reduce milk production nor body fat. No animal reduced both. Lactation number was positively and number of concentrate feeding days was negatively correlated with body fat mobilization after concentrates reduction. The method of reducing concentrates after body condition score has become stable seems to be well practicable, but animals mobilising body fat after the reduction might not cope well with that system; they have to be well observed. Further studies with more high yielding animals are needed to prove these results.