We are often asked “how much milk does a cow give” and this is quite a “big” question.

After calving a cows milk increases for about 6 weeks until it reaches it’s maximum. A typical Greenheyes cow will be giving about 35 litres per day at this point and the aim of a dairy farmer like myself is to maintain this maximum through good feeding for as long as possible.

This is usually until about a month after cow has become pregnant again.
Many farmers like ourselves record the cows milk quantity (yield) once a month in order to track their progress and to help when choosing which bull to use with them.

We use a company called National Milk Records (NMR) and once a month we record the morning and nights milk yield on this sheet shown here

Every cow’s milk is sampled as shown here into a special measure and it is then put into these “sample pots” the pots contain a blue preservative which keeps the milk fresh.

 

Once the milk has all been sampled the sample box with the recording sheet and pots is sealed and it is collected by the milk tanker driver when he comes for the milk.

The box is then taken to the dairy and it is then collected by the NMR van and taken to their laboratory for testing.

The milk is sampled in the same way as the dairy samples the sample from the milk vat and this gives us an individual picture of the cow’s milk and it can be an indicator of any potential problems such as mastitis.

The computer at NMR then works out each cows average butterfat and protein content together with the white blood cell count. The cell count is a good indicator of her health. Too high and she may need treating for an infection in her udder.

Besides this NMR also give an average for all the herd together with details of the calvings for the month and predicted calvings throughout the year helping us to plan our year.

All these details are then downloaded from the NMR website when they email us to say they are ready and kept in a programme supplied for our use.

To learn more about NMR visit their site by clicking here. www.nmr.co.uk

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