Impact of Calving Difficulty on Lameness in Dairy Cows
Dovilė Malašauskienė,
Ramūnas Antanaitis,
Vida Juozaitienė,
Algimantas Paulauskas,
Gediminas Urbonavičius,
Mindaugas Televičius,
Mingaudas Urbutis,
Lina Kajokienė,
Ayhan Yilmaz,
Walter Baumgartner
Affiliations
Dovilė Malašauskienė
Large Animal Clinic, Veterinary Academy, Lithuanian University of Health Sciences, Tilžės Str 18, LT-47181 Kaunas, Lithuania
Ramūnas Antanaitis
Large Animal Clinic, Veterinary Academy, Lithuanian University of Health Sciences, Tilžės Str 18, LT-47181 Kaunas, Lithuania
Vida Juozaitienė
Department of Biology, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Vytautas Magnus University, K. Donelaičio 58, LT-44248 Kaunas, Lithuania
Algimantas Paulauskas
Department of Biology, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Vytautas Magnus University, K. Donelaičio 58, LT-44248 Kaunas, Lithuania
Gediminas Urbonavičius
Department of Animal Breeding, Veterinary Academy, Lithuanian University of Health Sciences, Tilžės Str 18, LT-47181 Kaunas, Lithuania
Mindaugas Televičius
Large Animal Clinic, Veterinary Academy, Lithuanian University of Health Sciences, Tilžės Str 18, LT-47181 Kaunas, Lithuania
Mingaudas Urbutis
Large Animal Clinic, Veterinary Academy, Lithuanian University of Health Sciences, Tilžės Str 18, LT-47181 Kaunas, Lithuania
Lina Kajokienė
Institute of Biology Systems and Genetic Research, Veterinary Academy, Lithuanian University of Health Sciences, Tilžės Str 18, LT-47181 Kaunas, Lithuania
Ayhan Yilmaz
Department of Animal Sciences, Faculty of Agriculture, Siirt University, Kezer Yerleşkesi Veysel Karani Mah. Üniversite Cad. No:1, Merkez, 56100 Siirt, Turkey
Walter Baumgartner
University Clinic for Ruminants, University of Veterinary Medicine, Veterinaerplatz 1, A-1210 Vienna, Austria
The aims of our study were to evaluate the associations between calving difficulty and lameness and their effects on milk yield and quality traits. A total of 4723 calving cases were evaluated for calving difficulty using a 4-point scoring system. Lameness was diagnosed with a visual locomotion score system from 1 to 30 days after calving in 333 fresh dairy cows. Cows were divided into non-lame cows and lame cows. Milk quality traits were registered using Lely Astronaut® A3 milking robots. The normal distribution of all indicators was assessed using the Shapiro–Wilk normality test. Normally distributed milk indicators were expressed as mean ± standard error of the mean. Differences between the mean values of their groups were determined using the Fisher’s least significant difference test. We categorized cows by health status, i.e., lame (LA) and non-lame (HL) cows, and according to calving difficulty (CD) (on a 4-point scale: 1—no problem, 2—slight problem, 3—problems requiring assistance, 4—considerable force and extreme difficulty). In the present study, calving difficulty increased the risk of lameness in cows by 2.09-fold (95% CI = 1.644–2.650, p p < 0.001) than in the group where no assistance was required at calving. Similarly, herd affected milk fat (%) and the calving process—herd and the interaction between calving difficulty and herd—and lameness impacted the quantity of milk protein and lactose in cows. We found that severe lameness (3–4 points) (3.88–5.92% of cows) became more prevalent in those cows that had dystocia than those that did not (0.27–2.37% of cows).
