States Nutriad CEO Erik Visser: “Heat stress is a natural phenomenon that affects dairy cows and other domestic animals in tropical, sub-tropical and often in temperate regions of the world during the summer months. At Nutriad we offer solutions to reduce the negative impact on animal performance.”

Heat and humidity combined create an uncomfortable environment for dairy cows. The thermo-neutral zone of dairy cows ranges from just above zero to 22 ◦C, above this critical temperature (combined with humidity) cows begin to alter their basal metabolism and metabolic rate.

Economic consequences

Heat stress negatively impacts a variety of dairy parameters including milk yield and reproduction and therefore is a significant financial burden. The economic losses to the dairy industry in the USA alone due to heat stress were estimated to be in the range of 900 to 1,500 million $ a year. This figure represents a loss in the range of 110 to 190 $ per cow per year. Hence implementing measures to alleviate heat stress and restore cow's health and production efficiency will generate an interesting return on investment.

Feed Additives Strategy

The use of smart feed additives is one of the nutritional strategies to reduce the impact of heat stress on production and reproduction efficiency.  Explains Dr. Hassan Taweel, Nutriad Ruminant Manager: “Because heat stress affects rumen, endocrine and metabolic function, additives that act at both levels (rumen and metabolism) can be employed to alleviate heat stress. Nutri-Ferm Prime, a direct fed microbial product based on two different strains of fungal extracts and two strains of yeast cultures, has shown to be effective in stabilizing rumen function and improving microbial growth and fermentation capacity.”

Nutri-Ferm Prime has been rigorously tested in vitro and in vivo and found to be very effective in improving the growth rate of major bacterial and fungal species in the rumen (on average 20 % increase in growth rate and 17 % decline in doubling time). Addition of Nutri-Ferm Prime to the ration improves rumen microbial fermentation and increases microbial protein synthesis and fiber digestion, leading to 4 to 8 % improvement in milk yield.

Nutriad delivers products and services to over 80 countries through a network of own sales offices and distributors. Supported by 4 application laboratories and 5 manufacturing facilities on 3 continents.  Find out more at www.nutriad.com