Physiological and productive response of lactating dairy cows to the alpine transhumance at the end of the summer grazing

Abstract

The study aimed at verifying if the prolonged walking and fasting of the driving down transhumance from an alpine pasture to the farm of origin at the end of the summer grazing may impair health and productive response of lactating cows belonging to two specialised dairy breeds. The study considered a herd of 380 dairy cows and heifers of Italian Holstein and Italian Brown breeds that faced a driving down transhumance with a vertical drop of about 1050m. The animals walked for about 40 km completing the journey in 23 h, including three resting periods. Ten Holstein and nine Brown lactating cows were selected and monitored before and after the driving down transhumance taking individual blood samples and recording milk yield. The prolonged physical exercise and the limited water and energy intake during the driving down transhumance impaired cows’ metabolic profile resembling a status of ketosis. A significant drop in milk yield was observed in all the monitored animals regardless of the breed. The production loss was more severe (49.4%) in cows with high milk yield and less days in milk. These animals required also a prolonged time to recover from the milk drop due to the driving down transhumance and, based on these findings, they should be excluded from this practise.