Study of lameness incidence in Holstein cows using gait scoring method and its relation with animal production, parity and body condition score

Document Type : Other

Authors

Ali Hossein khani

Hassan Fazeli

Sadegh Alijani

Gholamali Moghaddam

Department of Animal Sciences, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Tabriz, Tabriz, Iran

10.22067/ijasr.v6i2.33280

Abstract

397 Holstein dairy cows were used to determine locomotion score, lameness prevalence and its relationship with age of the animal and body condition score (BCS). Locomotion score was determined using seven gait properties of animal. The results showed that more than 56% of cows in the herd had no locomotion problems. More than 40% of cows were placed in the group of suspected subclinical lameness and about 3.5% of the cows showed obvious clinical signs of lameness evident. Moreover increasing age or parity has increased the probability of lameness incidence. Primiparous and second parity of cows showed the lowest incidence of clinical and subclinical lameness. However frequency of prevalence of clinical and subclinical lameness increased significantly in older cows (greater than 2 lactations) (P

Keywords

gait scoring

clinical lameness

subclinical lameness

locomotion score

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