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  • Peripartum in dairy goats: nutritional strategies

    The transition period is the most delicate in dairy goats management, but diagnostic aids are not available yet. At the date, precise and functional nutrition is the only effective strategy to optimally face peripartum and transition periods. An accurate analysis of the real needs is mandatory to reach the goal.
  • Peripartum in dairy goats: know it to get it better

    Dairy goat breeding is slowly increasing as well as the interest in goats derived products. These animals have the same rearing problems and they are linked to milk cost and economical sustainability as dairy cows are. Goat milk is more expensive than bovine so that we can improve the return on investment in two ways: performance optimization and product valorization.
  • The importance of the dry period in dairy cows

    To dry-off a cow means stopping milking for a certain period before the next calving. Usually, this interruption is at 220 days of pregnancy to ensure 60 days of production stop. Genetic selection in the last decades and the continuous attempts to obtain a calving-fertilization period as short as possible led to dry-off cows with very high milk yield.
  • Fat-soluble vitamins: precious allies of the immune system and beyond

    The aim of clinical nutrition is to improve animal health and reducing the use of antibiotics to the bare minimum. If the immune system of dairy cows is efficient, there is a reduction in pathologies prevalence and they have a better recovery, especially for metritis and mastitis, without the use of a large amount of antibiotics.
  • Vitamin C: the endogenous synthesis is not enough

    Vitamin C is an essential molecule for humans so that its dietary intake is needed. Many animals are able to synthesize this vitamin starting from precursors such as glucose and galactose, through the glucuronic acid metabolic pathway. In ruminants, vitamin C is strongly degraded (about 60%) by rumen microflora and depends on their endogenous hepatic production.
  • The subtle (secondary) deficiency of methyl groups

    One of the most important goals of bovine genetic selection is to improve milk protein production. Thanks to this selection and to the specific nutrition, today the high genetic merit (HGM) Holstein cows produce 3% casein during winter. This extremely high protein production is causing more and more fertility and immune problems to the animals.
  • Summer low performance: reduced feed intake is not the only cause

    The perceived temperature is closely linked to the environmental one and to the relative humidity increase and increase significantly during summer. Every animal species can correctly dissipate endogenous heat to maintain the physiological temperature in a specific perceived temperature range: past this, the body temperature increases, and the animal experiences heat stress.
  • Essential fatty acids and fertility

    Lipids are among the most important component of dairy cows' diet. The high energy deriving from lipids, but most of all the dietary intake of specific fatty acids, have a positive impact on ovarian and reproductive function. They stimulate prostaglandin activity, steroid hormones synthesis from cholesterol, and insulin production.
  • Rumen protected methionine to improve buffalo milk quality

    Bovines and buffaloes are very different, there are two different typologies of reared buffaloes: swamp buffalo and river buffalo.
  • Differences between buffaloes and cows

    In “Nutrition Ecology of the Ruminant” (1982), Peter J. Van Soest introduced new nutrients that were subsequently used for the development of the Cornell Net Carbohydrate and Protein System (CNCPS®), and accurately described the ecological position of ruminants.
  • How to improve colostrum quality

    Ruminants placenta avoids immunoglobulins transfer from the mother to the fetus (passive immunity). Calves are not protected against infections until they develop their own active immunity, except for antibodies received through colostrum.
  • Oxidative stress: the most insidious of metabolic diseases

    ATP is the fundamental energy molecule for the organism's metabolic function. Its production is derived from the oxidation of different substrates such as carbohydrates and fatty acids. ATP is like a charged battery: when the energy is finished the molecule becomes ADP and is subsequently “re-charged” into ATP.
  • Functional nutrition helps to prevent the economic losses related to the transition period

    The passage from the dry period (or the last weeks before calving in heifers) to the puerperium (the 20 days after calving) is really challenging for dairy cows. During this period (the transition period) there is a higher incidence of metabolic pathologies and of related infections.
  • Ruminanti

    Ruminants need amino acids, not proteins

    In ruminant nutrition, it is still quite common to look at the general crude protein level, with only marginal attention to the amino acid content. At the same time, high CP (and carbohydrates) is accused of the increased podal diseases and mastitis, and reduced fertility (Butles, 1998; Moretti, 1991).
  • B vitamins supplementation of ruminant diets is really useful?

    Water-soluble vitamins are vitamin C and vitamins of the B group. Choline is also, improperly, inserted among these vitamins because of its certain metabolic functions and defined dosage of use. These vitamins are synthesized by the rumen and intestinal microflora and their supplementation with the diet is still debated.