ABSTRACT
Bovine digital dermatitis (BDD) is a contagious infectious disease which causes lameness in dairy cows. It has a multifactorial etiology which is not yet fully understood but Treponema spp. seem to play a significant role in development of BDD lesions. This study evaluated the presence of Treponema phylotypes commonly associated with BDD (T. medium/T. vincentii, T. phagedenis and T. putidum/T. denticola), in four farms different areas in Iran. Single biopsies were taken from 113 Holstein cows with active BDD lesions (scored according to size) on the farms and polymerase chain reaction assays used to detect 16S rRNA nucleotide fragments of three BDD Treponema phylotype groups: ''T. medium/T. vincentii'', ''T. phagedenis'' and ''T. putidum/T. denticola'' (now T. pedis). Over 95.00% of samples were positive for at least one of phylotypes, with 89.00%, 91.00 %, and 66.00% of samples were positive for T. putidum/T. denticola, T. phagedenis and T. medium/T. vincentii, respectively. Out of the 113 samples, 60.00% were positive for all three phylotypes, the detection of T. putidum/T. denticola was positively associated with detection of both T. phagedenis and T. medium/T. vincentii. No association between lesion size and phylotypes identified was found but there were significant differences between farms in the proportion of each phylotypes identified. Further research is required to establish the factors influencing the proportions of individual phylotypes, especially at the farm level.
ABSTRACT
Lameness is a major welfare problem in the dairy industry. Environmental factors, such as flooring surface, as well as cow-level factors, such as udder fill, can influence gait. The aim of the current study was to test whether motivation to walk affects gait attributes and whether this effect differs between lame and sound cows. We trained cows to walk down an alley for a food reward and assessed walking speed, stride length, head bob, and back arch of cows previously identified as either lame (n = 7) or sound (n = 10). Cows were assessed when they walked toward a food reward and toward no reward. Cows walked faster and had longer stride length and less variation in head bob when approaching the reward; these effects were similar in both sound and lame cows. We concluded that motivation to walk affects several gait attributes of dairy cows.
Subject(s)
Cattle Diseases/etiology , Cattle/psychology , Gait , Lameness, Animal/etiology , Motivation , Reward , Walking , Animals , FemaleABSTRACT
Wide variety of timings and techniques has been used based on the housing, production, availability of requirements etc. This current study was done for a morphologic evaluation of the cow's digit in different trimming times. A dairy herd with 2200 milking cow, free stalls barns, average daily production of 36 liters per cow was selected. Forty cows were assigned to four groups based on hoof trimming times as, 100-120 days in milk (Group I), cows before drying (Group II), visual long toed cows (Group III) and delayed pregnant cows (Group IV). Toe length from coronary band to the toe tip (A), dorsal hoof angle (D), toe height from coronary band in toe region to the ground level (B), heel height from coronary band in heel region to the ground level (C) and heel height to toe length proportion was measured. The highest toe length was recorded in medial digit of group IV (9.19 ± 0.68 cm) and the lowest one recorded in lateral digit of group I (8.28 ± 0.62 cm). Distribution of the cows in different groups under study was based on their toe length, as the highest and lowest distribution were recorded in groups III and I, respectively. The highest measurements in all indices were recorded in group IV that followed by group III except for toe height that was higher in group II following group IV. The lowest toe length was recorded in group I that needs more attention due to the risk of over trimming and its supposed complications in this group.
