Association between change in body weight during early lactation and milk production in automatic milking system herds

The objective of this observational study was to investigate the association between percent body weight (BW) change in early lactation and the 90-d cumulative milk yield of dairy cows in automatic milking system (AMS) herds. Retrospective daily cow data were collected from the Lely T4C (Lely Industries, Maassluis, the Netherlands) software on 34 farms. Cows were categorized by parity into parity 1 (P1), parity 2 (P2), or parity 3 and greater (P3+). The BW change over the first 21 d of lactation was calculated as the percentage difference between the cow's average BW across d 20 through 22 and the average BW across d 2 through 4 (initial BW) postpartum. The 90-d cumulative milk yield was the outcome variable in a mixed linear regression model, with BW change, parity, their interaction, and season of calving as explanatory variables. Farm and cow nested within farm (n = 4,695) were random effects in the model. On average, cows in all 3 parity groups lost BW during the first 21 d in milk. The 21-d BW change had a negative quadratic relationship with 90-d cumulative milk yield for all parity groups; P1, P2, and P3+ cows with a 21-d BW change of −7.42%, −5.02%, and −4.52%, respectively, were more productive over 90 d in milk (P1 = 3,123 ± 52.6 kg, P2 = 4,271 ± 52.8 kg, and P3+ = 4,548 ± 52.2 kg). The findings of this study highlight the benefits of monitoring BW change in early lactation and may contribute to future research aimed to develop or improve predictive models for milk production in herds using AMS.