On the factors affecting somatic cell count in milk
2000
Kiiman, H. | Saveli, O. (Estonian Agricultural Univ., Tartu (Estonia). Inst. of Animal Husbandry)
The cows being bred in Estonia are suitable for local conditions due to their high milk performance and relatively good fattening and meat qualities. The healthy udder is the prerequisite for obtaining from a cow the maximum production and high quality milk is the primary task of a present-day dairy cow. Somatic cell count in milk is a measure of udder health as well as milk quality. The objective of the present work was to study the effect of the following factors on somatic cell count in milk; milking technique; working operations performed by the milker; sire of the dairy cow; heritability. The experimental farms were chosen from agricultural enterprises applying different milking and cow-keeping technologies. Daughters of 21 bulls were studied. The data about ten-month milk yield, fat and protein content and somatic cell count of the milk of the daughters of each bull were collected. Cow's sire, enterprise, birth-year, lactation milking equipment and milking operator were fixed in data-base. Monitoring of the working operations of the milkers, who milked the cows selected for our trials, were carried out. The duration of each element of the working process was recorded. SAS-program was used for data processing. Procedure REML was used to estimate the dispersion components and heritabilities
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