Recently, I got the chance to ride along with a fellow educator to take feed samples. While sampling the bag, reproductive success got brought up in relation to nutrition management. April and I got to delight in our shared knowledge of “cost of days open” and I realize now we come from two different approaches to how to understand the issue and decided it might be insightful to add to this newsletter.
What is meant by “cost of days open?” The days suggest a timeline, and specifically the number of days between when a cow calves, and when she conceives her next calf.
By convenience, I will share insight from fellow researchers from my time at the University of Kentucky. “A common economic measure of reproductive performance is the cost of extended days open, referring to how much money is lost for every extra day a cow is not pregnant. Generally, producers and industry professionals estimate this cost at $3.00 to $5.00 per day open. However, this estimate may not account for variation in expenses and revenues over time or between herds, meaning cost per day open is likely overestimated in some conditions while underestimated on others.“ (Karmella Dolecheck and Jeffrey Bewley, Ph.D https://bit.ly/UKcostofdaysopen) Concisely put, every day your dairy cows are not pregnant, you are incurring an economic loss.
Now, it is intuitive that farmers would want to minimize losses, wherever possible. They also realize that perfect breed-back is not achievable and certainly not practical. Where does that leave a farmer wanting to improve with this information? To me, if you don’t already have a good idea of how long it is taking your herd to get pregnant after calving, measuring that is a very good place to start. You can’t manage what you don’t first measure. Does your farm have a target number of days open? 120 days open is one recommendation, but your farm may have reasons the desired calving interval will drive a different target for “days open.”
by Jessica Richard, CCE Delaware County Farm Management Educator