Hidden costs of dystocia: Fertility and long term survival in dairy cows

Abstract

This paper reports two of the short and longer term outcomes of dystocia for the cow. Calving interval (a measure of cow fertility) may be increased by up to 42 days following a difficult calving. Cow survival may also be reduced, though farmers rarely identify a difficult calving as a cause of a culling or death of a cow more than a month after calving. We investigated the varying culling rates for cows following differing degrees of calving difficulty, particularly cows culled soon after calving, or later than 21 days after calving. Any degree of calving difficulty reduces cow survival and fertility, depending on the severity of dystocia.