High bacteria counts in your bulk tank milk can be very frustrating to all parties involved. In today’s milk market, these higher bacteria counts can also jeopardize your milk quality premium, as many cooperatives have bundled the different tests together.

With all the things going on around your dairy, have you ever thought about whether cows actually like being milked? How would you know if they were happy or unhappy with the milking process?

It still amazes us when we get onto a dairy that has all their milking data at the push of a button but is not using any of it.

Harvesting high-quality milk involves interactions among humans, cows, milking equipment and the environment. Implementing and training staff on milking routine standard operating procedures can influence the outcome, but efforts in the parlor shouldn’t end there.

Skin can chap due to frequent washing, repeated wetting or exposure to cold, dry or windy weather. Teats are subjected to these processes during every milking. Teat dips with effective emollient packages can rejuvenate dry teats. Skin conditioners come in many varieties.

Sometimes it is amazing to think about how much hinges on the four teats of the dairy cow. If a teat is damaged or destroyed, we potentially lose the milk from that quarter or, worse yet, with a severe infection we lose the whole cow.

Preventing mastitis is no easy task due to the many risk factors that can be present on any given dairy. The variation in the biology of the cow, the bugs and the humans performing the tasks can make it very difficult to control on any given day. One risk factor, though, that should be easier to manage is the function of the milking equipment.