Abstract

Dairy farming is an important activity in Argentina. The country produced over 11,000 million litres of milk in 2015 (Ministerio de Agroindustria 2015). Milk production is based on the utilisation of grazed lucerne pastures (Medicago sativa L), and the use of supplements such as silage, hay and concentrate feeds. Pasture comprises between 30% and 50% of the diet. Average milk production per cow is 5,900 kg/cow per year (equivalent to 401.2 kg of milk solids/cow per year; INTA 2015). Due to a favourable ratio between milk price and concentrate feeds price (average ratio milk to concentrate price over 1.5), dairy farmers in Argentina include great amounts of concentrate feeds in their systems. Over 95% of dairy herds of Argentina are Holstein, and cows are milked twice a day (TAD) (FAO 2011). In the last decade, studies have been conducted, mainly in New Zealand, but also in Europe, to evaluate the effects of once-a-day (OAD) milking during the whole lactation (Stelwagen et al., 2013). Lifestyle benefits for farmers and employees and improvement in animal health and reproductive performance are the main motivations to choose OAD milking (Bewsell et al., 2008)...

B, Lazzarini, L Peluffo, N Lopez-Villalobos, L Hendrikse, and J Baudracco

Proceedings of the New Zealand Society of Animal Production, Volume 77, Rotorua, 61-63, 2017