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 “The main goal of the SCC calculator is to assist dairy
producers in making management decisions on an individual herd
level,” says Phil Cardoso, a professor in animal sciences at
Illinois. “This will improve overall health and decrease
economic losses due to mastitis. Making these beneficial
management decisions may then allow the dairy to improve milk
quality and dairy efficiency, all while increasing overall
economic gain.”
The goal of most dairy producers is to maintain a healthy herd
while maximizing economic efficiencies. Mastitis is the most
prevalent disease that restricts producers from achieving this
goal. In 2014, a survey from the National Animal Health
Monitoring System showed that roughly 24.1 percent of all cows
in the top 17 dairy-producing states suffered from some either
clinical or subclinical mastitis. It is estimated that the U.S.
dairy industry loses roughly $1 billion in total milk revenue
and about $110 per cow annually from production losses due to
mastitis.
“Most milk cooperatives award producers with incentives for
reaching higher milk quality,” Cardosa says. “If a dairy
producer is not receiving a milk quality bonus due to high SCC
cows, they could be losing out on a substantial amount of
increased income. Most producers are aware of their bulk tank
SCC. What they lack is a way of determining how much monetary
loss is incurred by not receiving a milk quality bonus. The
Illinois dairy focus team has developed a solution to this
problem.”
The SCC calculator allows producers to identify cows in the herd
that are contributing the highest percentage to the bulk tank
SCC. The calculator also identifies cows that have chronic or
new cases of mastitis by sorting cows by highest current and
previous test day SCC.
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“Not only is the user able to find problem cows,” says Cardoso,
“but they are also able to see the benefits that would result
from removing certain cows from the herd by viewing the economic
gains table. This key aspect of the calculator allows the user
to view the differences between bulk tank values with and
without high SCC cows. These values are influenced by the bulk
tank milk amount, bulk tank SCC, current milk price, and milk
quality bonuses per hundredweight if an SCC parameter is
achieved when a cow is removed. The table gives the producer an
actual figure for the amount of money they are missing out on by
keeping certain cows in the milking string instead of using
their milk for alternate purposes and receiving a milk quality
bonus.”
The Dairy Focus Somatic Cell Count Calculator is easy to operate and
free to download. There are versions currently available for
DairyComp 305 and PCDart, as well as a version for dairy producers
who prefer to enter their data manually. Users can visit
www.dairyfocus.illinois.edu and click on the ‘Tools’ page
to download the calculator. An instructional video is available
(http://go.illinois.edu/SCC_Calculator) that shows users how to
import data from their management program, and gives the user
beneficial information on how to use the calculator to analyze their
herd and assist in making critical management decisions
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