– Dr. Michelle Arnold, DVM – Ruminant Extension Veterinarian (UKVDL)
Figure 1: The UK Beef Cow Forage Supplement Tool can be found at http://forage-supplement-tool.ca.uky.edu/
The Top Ten New Years’ Resolutions, first published in January 2022, serves as a good reminder of the management practices that almost always need fine-tuning in cow/calf operations. As winter gives way to spring, try to incorporate one or more of the following resolutions, updated for 2025.
In 2025, I resolve to . . .
1. Improve the water the cattle drink: Water is exceptionally important, relatively inexpensive, and readily available but it is often the most ignored nutrient. Water consumption varies depending on age, breed, stage of pregnancy or lactation, and outdoor temperature and humidity, but it can reach as high as 25-30 gallons per day during hot weather. Water-related health problems are seldom due to what is in the water but rather the decrease in water intake because of the poor quality, bad taste and offensive odor. Decreased consumption is just as harmful as not having enough water available. When cattle do not drink enough, feed intake and milk production drop, heat stress worsens, and overall immunity suffers. If cattle are allowed to stand in their water sources such as in ponds, fecal and urine contamination will decrease water quality and certain diseases (for example, leptospirosis) can easily spread through contaminated water. If the water quality is good but the tanks are dirty, the message is the same-clean the tanks to improve water intake.
2. Know how much mineral my cattle consume: Having good quality trace mineral out for cattle is only half the battle; knowing it is being consumed at the expected rate is equally important. Check the mineral feeders regularly and always keep trace mineral in front of the cattle but also keep track of the number of bags you feed over a 1–2-week period of time. Check the mineral label for expected consumption, typically 3-4 ounces per head per day. Next question-how many head of cattle have access to the mineral? If the cows have calves that also eat minerals, they must be included because calves consume roughly half the amount allotted to an adult cow. Then do the math! If I have 20 cows that should be consuming 4 oz per head per day (80 oz daily) and a 50-pound bag is equal to 800 ounces, then a bag of mineral should last roughly 10 days. If cattle are consuming too much mineral, try moving the feeder farther from the water source or mixing in loose salt to slow the consumption rate. However, mineral feeders should not be allowed to stand empty, or cattle will overeat salt or mineral when it is offered again, which can be deadly. If cattle are not consuming enough mineral, make sure to provide adequate access for cows and calves, for example 1 mineral feeder per 15 cow/calf pairs. Do not offer additional loose salt, salt blocks, or alternate sources of salt because it will reduce trace mineral intake. Trace minerals, especially copper and selenium, are often found to be far below acceptable levels in KY cattle without daily supplementation. The absence of these vital nutrients is a major factor in disease development. The keys to using a free-choice trace mineral product are to ensure cattle have access to mineral 100% of the time, use a palatable, quality product and make sure they are consuming it at the expected level.
3. Know my hay quality and feed it out according to my animals’ need: Forage testing takes the guesswork out of meeting the nutrient requirements in cattle. Once the forage quality is known, a supplemental feed can be chosen to meet deficiencies if needed, especially for cows in early lactation and for young, growing cattle with high energy needs (see Figure 1 above). Nutritional requirements are influenced by body size, production/pregnancy status, level of milk production, growth rate, as well as the environmental conditions.
If hay quality is poor, for example if cut very ripe (late stage of maturity), rained on while curing, and/or baled with enough moisture to support mold growth, supplementing cattle with adequate energy and protein sources will likely be required to meet their basic metabolic needs until grass if available again. Many cows and calves presented for necropsy (an animal “autopsy”) in late winter reveal a complete absence of fat and death is due to starvation. It is often difficult for producers to realize that cattle can starve while consuming all the hay they can eat – especially if the forage has crude protein levels in the 3-4% range, and TDN (energy) is <40% – as is common in some late-cut, overmature, rained-on hay. Many producers purchase “protein tubs” varying from 16-30% protein to make up for any potential protein deficiencies but fail to address the severe lack of energy in the diet. Both are critical components.
Keep cows from losing weight, especially in late pregnancy and early lactation. Learn to body condition score cows so you will know where on the cow to look for signs of early weight loss. Inadequate nutrition severely affects the developing immune system of the fetus in a pregnant cow. A weak cow may experience dystocia (a slow, difficult birth) resulting in lack of oxygen to the calf during delivery, leading to a dead or weak calf. Calves born to deficient dams have less “brown fat”, so they are less able to generate body heat and are slower to stand and nurse. Poor colostrum quality and quantity from protein and energy-deficient dams will not support calf vitality, survival and performance. Thin cows will be the last ones to rebreed.
4. Have a daylight relationship with my veterinarian: Work with a veterinarian during regular business hours to establish a valid veterinary-client-patient relationship (VCPR). Cattle herds are unique entities with different risks for disease on every farm so working routinely with a veterinarian is your best bet to improve herd health. Examples include asking your vet to pregnancy check the cows, to vaccinate and deworm the cattle, to perform breeding soundness exams on the bulls, or to design a vaccination program for your cattle and then purchase the vaccines from the vet. Large animal veterinarians can make a lot more money in much more comfortable places doing small animal practice (dogs and cats) so appreciate these individuals for the services they provide. Don’t wait until “the sky is falling” to give them a call.
5. Think twice before delivering an antibiotic to an animal that appears to be sick: Antibiotics are effective against bacterial infections, period. Disease may be due to viruses, parasites, metabolic disorders, cancer, and many other causes, none of which respond to antibiotic treatment. Giving an antibiotic when it is not needed only leads to antibiotic resistance and treatment failure when you need it the most. See point #4-a good physical exam by a veterinarian goes a long way when it comes to selection of the right treatment regimen. At minimum, check the sick animal’s temperature before initiating antibiotic therapy; if the animal does not have a fever of 104°F or above, put the antibiotics away.
6. Improve my understanding of biosecurity and figure out where I am failing: Purchasing bulls, cows, or calves, and bringing them home to the farm is likely the single most dangerous time for introduction of new diseases into a herd. Even show animals returning to the farm from events should be isolated to prevent introduction of disease when they re-enter the herd. Any newly purchased animals should be isolated either off the farm or in a well-segregated area for at least 2 weeks (3-4 weeks is better) and observed for any signs of illness. During the period of isolation, a veterinarian should be consulted to appropriately test and vaccinate new arrivals. The best practice is to purchase animals from herds of known health status that will provide a vaccination and health history. The introduction of an animal with an untreatable disease such as Johne’s or a BVD persistently infected (PI) animal could have devastating, expensive, long-term effects on the health of the cow/calf herd. Understand the risks and make decisions accordingly.
7. Be better prepared to handle labor and delivery problems: Checking on cows and, more importantly, on heifers close to calving allows early detection of difficulty and intervention if needed during calving. If a cow or heifer is in active labor for an hour and making no progress, calving intervention is indicated. Assist or call for assistance with calving as early as possible, especially with heifers. Make sure calves start nursing after calving, keeping in mind that calves should stand within 30 minutes of delivery and nurse within 30 minutes of standing.If in doubt that the calf will be able to stand and nurse within an hour, make sure the calf is warm and then feed a good quality colostrum (from the dam or replacer), at least 1-2 quarts, within an hour of birth and again before 6 hours old. Familiarize yourself with how to use an esophageal feeder; an excellent video “How to Feed Newborn Calves (esophageal feeding)” is available on the Beef Cattle Research Council website at https://www.beefresearch.ca along with many other educational videos.
8. Improve my forage base: If you graze cattle, think of yourself as a grass farmer because you sell pounds of calf produced by a cow that eats grass and makes milk. The UK Forages website: http://forages.ca.uky.edu/ is full of easy-to-find, useful information to make pastures more productive. On the website, sign up for the monthly UK forage newsletter that is full of timely tips to improve pastures and forages. Check out their instructional videos at https://www.youtube.com/c/KYForages
9. Keep better records in a standardized fashion: It is hard to make well-informed decisions without information. At the very least, every animal should have a readable ID tag and calving dates should be recorded. Other parameters such as calf birth and weaning weights, sex, and dam information help differentiate the poor performing cows from the great ones. Vaccination records should include date administered, vaccine name, lot and serial numbers and expiration dates at a minimum. Computerized records are preferred but one of the pitfalls to any computerized record keeping system is what is known as a “free text field” where the producer types in a piece of information in a provided space. For example, a producer may want to track the calves that developed diarrhea so in the disease column, the producer types “scours” in the free text field. However, “scours” has multiple names and someone else may type in “diarrhea”, “loose stool”, or “enteric disease” in the free text field. Later, when it is time to search the records for how many calves developed scours, those calves with diarrhea but with disease names other than “scours” will be missed. Other problems such as misspelled words, too many pieces of information in the same field, and vague information make analysis of free text nearly impossible.
10. Find a trusted source for information and stop believing everything on Dr. Google or see posted on social media: This is true in much more than beef cattle production. There is plenty of misinformation available and discernment is becoming a lost art. Veterinarians, Extension agents, and University Extension specialists, among others, can help answer or point you in the right direction when it comes to questions about the health and care of cattle. Just ask!
Remember the old phrase, often attributed to Albert Einstein, “insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” Adopt a few new practices or improve some old ones this year and see what happens in your cattle herd. Hope you have a prosperous 2025.