Udder health and milking technology on the Hungarian large-scale dairy farms

Abstract

The aim of this study was to survey the milk yield, milk quality and milking technology on Hungarian large-scale (>50 cows) dairy farms and to evaluate the possible impact of milking parlour type on milk production and quality (somatic cell count). The survey was performed by using a questionnaire on 377 Hungarian dairy farms in 2017. Farms were categorized according to their milking parlour types (herringbone, parallel, carousel and others). The average SCC on the Hungarian dairy farms was high (405,199 SCC/ml). Farms using herringbone milking system had the lowest milk quality (429.240 SCC/ml) and milk yield (27.01 kg/day). The type of milking parlour had an impact on milk quality (p=0.05) and milk yield (p=0.03).