Recommendations regarding the care and housing of dairy calves have changed dramatically over the last decade. During this presentation, Dr. von Keyserlingk will highlight the latest research undertaken on feeding and housing of the milk fed dairy calf. She will also highlight some of the areas of calf care that are likely going to receive increased attention over the next decade and areas that are in need targeted research in order to find sustainable solutions.

Are you causing the heat stress, or is the environment? Heat stress is a killer; from productivity to cow health, the side effects are real. In this webinar, Dr. Matt Brady walks through a recent case study and talks about the dangerous effects of artificial heat stress environments.

Calves are the foundation for a successful healthy herd, so it’s crucial to make sure they are living in the best possible environment, and it starts with the air around them. Dr. Michael Wolf is the owner of Country Doctors Veterinary Service and a consulting veterinarian for VES-Artex, he will discuss how important a healthy environment is for the long-term health, wellbeing and productivity of growing heifers. He’ll walk us through design goals and the cost/benefit analysis of your ventilation investment.

In this webinar Dr. Mario Mondaca will discuss baffles in negative pressure ventilation systems for adult dairy cows. We will review the overall design philosophy behind baffles and the history of cross-ventilated barns, the type of barns that most commonly use baffles. We will also look at the latest research on baffle design and position on cross-ventilated barns as well as tunnel-ventilated barns. Finally, we will address unintentional baffles that deflect air away from the animal occupied zone like waterers, concrete walls, cross-over walls, feed bunks, etc. We will review examples from measurements on farms as well as computational fluid dynamics models.

Whereas the beneficial effects of cooling cows during lactation are clear, less work has been done to examine the impact of dry cow cooling on subsequent performance and health, and on the developing fetus. This presentation will explore the recent work related to late gestation cooling on milk yield, metabolism, and immune status in the cow, and also reviews the effects of in utero heat stress on the heifer calf. Finally, the economic implications of heat stress in the dry period will be explored.