Invited review: Academic and applied approach to evaluating longevity in dairy cows

Schuster, Jesse C.; Barkema, Herman W.; Vries, Albert De; Kelton, D.F.; Orsel, Karin

doi:10.3168/jds.2020-19043

Cited by 69 publications

(62 citation statements)

References 108 publications

(168 reference statements)

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“…It is likely that rebreeding was delayed for goats in this class, in order to utilize their full performance capacity. This is similar to findings on extended lactation in high-production dairy cows, where extended lactation lasts around 16 months (Sehested et al, 2019). With this strategy, extended lactation can be used to reduce offspring but still use animals with high genetic potential for reproduction.…”

Section: Influencing Factorssupporting

confidence: 84%

“…In the data evaluation, extended lactation was examined. Extended lactation is becoming increasingly common as a method of milking animals over a long period without requiring them to birth offspring (Moog et al, 2012;Sehested et al, 2019). This practice could be an influencing factor on the lifetime traits examined, which is why it has been taken into account in the present investigation.…”

Section: Animals and Materialsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Genetic analysis of lifetime productivity traits in goats

Wolber

Hamann²,

Herold

2021

Arch. Anim. Breed.

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Abstract. As part of the development of a breeding programme for dairy goats to support sustainable production in organic farming, the overall aim of the present study was to identify traits that can be used as selection criteria for lifetime productivity. The breeding goal is high lifetime productivity with a good milk composition and a good level of robustness in the animals, especially within grazing systems. The lifetime productivity traits analysed in this study were the length of the animal's productive life (LPL), the lifetime efficiency (LEF), and the animal's milk yield efficiency with respect the total number of lactating days (EDM); the average fat and protein content over the animal's lifetime, the fat-to-protein ratio (FPR), and the urea content (UC) were also included as indirect health traits and potential indicators of robustness in dairy goats. The traits' influencing factors, phenotypic and genetic correlations, and heritability were examined. Furthermore, factors influencing milk yield in the first 120 d of lactation during the animal's first lactation were analysed. The aim of investigating milk yield during the first lactation was to consider a connection between early performance recoding in the life of an animal and LPL, LEF, and EDM. In total, lactation and pedigree data from 9192 dairy goats of the common German Fawn (GF) and German White (GW) dairy breeds were used. Prerequisites were that the investigated birth cohorts had to have definitively completed their lifetime production, and a high proportion of goats had to have completed extended lactation. The data analysis showed that breed did not influence milk yield. The age at first kidding, the average number of kids born during the animal's lifetime, and the lactation length did influence the milk yield. This applies to the milk yield during the first 120 d of the first lactation as well as over the lifetime of an animal. Considering the influencing factors, the results showed that LPL was genetically and positively correlated with LEF and EDM (rg=0.65±0.06 and 0.29±0.07 respectively). The heritability of LPL, LEF, and EDM was 0.22±0.02, 0.29±0.03, and 0.44±0.03 respectively. Regarding the lifetime milk composition, the heritability of protein and fat content, FPR, and UC was 0.63±0.02, 0.52±0.02, 0.32±0.03, and 0.47±0.04 respectively. The heritability regarding the milk yield during the first 120 d of the first lactation was 0.34±0.03. We found that the milk yield during the first 120 d of the first lactation showed a genetic correlation with LPL, LEF, and EDM of 0.30±0.08, 0.82±0.04, and 0.89±0.03 respectively. In summary, LPL, LEF, and EDM are suitable traits to indicate lifetime productivity in dairy goats. An additional indicator for lifetime productivity could be the milk yield during the first 120 d of the first lactation. Moreover, FPR and UC appear to be promising indicator traits for the health and robustness of dairy goats. The present study showed the importance of considering extended lactation in selective breeding programmes as well as the importance of modelling extended lactation in the breeding value estimation.

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Section: Influencing Factorssupporting

confidence: 84%

Section: Animals and Materialsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Genetic analysis of lifetime productivity traits in goats

Wolber

Hamann²,

Herold

2021

Arch. Anim. Breed.

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“…Herds with higher longevity did not have a significantly higher nor lower gross margin than herds with a lower longevity. Although it is frequently reported that a higher longevity will have positive economic consequences because of less young stock rearing and a higher average milk production [e.g., (1,13)], this was not observed in the observational data used in the current study. Negative effects of a higher longevity, like the reduction in livestock sales due to a reduction in the removal of dairy cows or increased health and/or reproduction costs (15,16), might have leveled out potential positive consequences.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 54%

“…Longevity of a dairy cow can be defined as the total lifespan of a cow or as the length of productive life (1). The productive lifespan of average dairy cows in industrialized countries varies from <3 years (2) to at least 4.5 year (3).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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An Empirical Analysis on the Longevity of Dairy Cows in Relation to Economic Herd Performance

et al. 2021

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Several studies have stated the various effects of an increased dairy cow longevity on economic herd performance, but empirical studies are lacking. This study aimed to investigate the association between longevity of dairy cows and the economic performance of dairy herds based on longitudinal Dutch accounting data. Herd and farm accounting data (n = 855 herds) over the years 2007–2016 were analyzed. Herd data contained yearly averages on longevity features, herd size and several production variables. Longevity was defined as the age of cows at culling and by lifetime milk production of culled cows. Farm accounting data contained yearly averages on revenues, fixed and variable costs of the herds, by which gross margins were defined. Data was analyzed using generalized linear mixed modeling, with gross margin as dependent variable. The independent variables consisted of average age of culled cows, average lifetime production of culled cows, year, herd size, herd intensity (milk production per ha), herd expansion rate, soil type, milking system, successor availability, total full-time equivalent, heifer ratio (% of heifers per cow) and use of outsourced heifer rearing. Herd was included as a random effect to account for the heterogeneity among herds. Descriptive statistics showed that the average age of culled cows was 5.87 (STD = 0.78) years and the average lifetime milk production of culled cows was 31.87 (STD = 7.56) tons per cow with an average herd size of 89 cows (STD = 38.85). The average age of culled cows was stable over the 10 years (variation between 5.79 AND 5.90 years). The gross margin was on average €24.80/100 kg milk (STD = 4.67), with the lowest value in year 2009 and the highest value in year 2013. Gross margin was not significantly associated with age of culled cows and lifetime milk production of culled cows. Variance in longevity between herds was large (STD = 0.78 years) but herds with a higher longevity did not perform economically better nor worse than herds resulting in lower longevity. This indicates that, within current practice, there is potential for improving longevity in order to meet society's concerns on animal welfare and environmental pollution, without affecting the economic performance of the herd.

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New Concepts and Possible Ways to Improve Viability of High Yielding Cows

Cherepanov¹

2021

Fundamental and Applied Scientific Research in the Development of Agriculture in the Far East (AFE-2021)

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Invited review: Academic and applied approach to evaluating longevity in dairy cows

Abstract: In its simplest form, longevity is defined as the ability to live a long life. Within the dairy industry, longevity has been defined and measured in many different ways, and the aim of this review is to disentangle the definitions and provide some clarity.

Cited by 69 publications

References 108 publications

Genetic analysis of lifetime productivity traits in goats

Genetic analysis of lifetime productivity traits in goats

An Empirical Analysis on the Longevity of Dairy Cows in Relation to Economic Herd Performance

New Concepts and Possible Ways to Improve Viability of High Yielding Cows

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