Without good roadways and grazing infrastructure on dairy farms, grass utilisation is going to be limited as accessing paddocks under difficult conditions will cause problems for cows at this time of year when heat activity is high.

Under such stressful conditions, poor infrastructure may lead to injury and lameness.

First cuts of silage will now be wrapped up on many farms and the likelihood is that heavy machinery would have been up and down these roadways, causing large stones to surface and the routes to be neglected, if the silage ground is on the home block.

A single case of lameness could potentially cost €350 – from loss in production, to reduced fertility, to the cost of treating and culling.

At this time of the breeding season, it is crucial that roadways and collecting yards are kept in good condition, as lameness will affect fertility performance and milk production.

Before getting into the implications lameness has on fertility, it is important to note that any form of lameness severely compromises cow welfare, and is quite often a common cause of culling animals from the herd.

This pain associated with lameness has a direct impact on cows’ behaviour, as they will show less signs of oestrus, making it difficult to detect when a cow is in heat.

When a cow is lame, they will eat less, and have longer periods of negative energy balance, decreasing reproductive performance.

The knock-on affect of this is detrimental to your breeding plan as it can lead to lower submission rates, delayed ovarian cyclicity, reduced conception rates, increased calving interval and higher chance of ovarian cysts forming.

Lame cows will also be more prone to uterine infections after calving and have higher pregnancy losses.

This is particularly important at this stage of breeding as, in reality, many farms will be letting out stock bulls in the coming days and weeks. If bulls are mounting lame cows or cows that are even mildly lame, it can lead to severe damage.

Any cows that are currently lame should be picked out of the herd, while mobility scoring should be carried out to pick out the ones that are only mildly lame, before it becomes an issue.

Cows that are severely lame will be obvious - they will stick to the back of the herd and will be easily copped at each milking - but the mildly lame cows will not be as obvious.

These cows should be trimmed by your hoof trimmer in the next couple of days and any severe cases kept in a nearby paddock to save them travelling long distances on the sore hoof.

The prevention and management of lameness in your herd starts off by maintaining the quality of the cow roadways, which will be a huge help in reducing the number of cows that need to be trimmed.

In order for cows to be able to move at their own pace, stress-free and unpressurised, roadways need to be sufficiently wide enough for the number of cows in the herd – 120 cows require 5m width, with extra 0.5m for every 100 cows thereafter.

The road surface has to be kept in good order as it will help limit the cases of hoof trauma and white line damage.

A 3-5% fall for a camber or slope in the middle of the roadway to the edge is recommended to allow the water on the roadways to get away, resulting in a comfortable surface for cows.

To reduce bottlenecks, the entrances into paddocks should be wider than the roadway. Avoid any distractions on roadways such as water troughs, as they will upset cow flow.

Although it is sometimes impossible, the use of heavy machinery on roadways should be kept to a minimum. Where possible, the wire should be dropped at the top of the paddock for heavy machinery to access.

The entrance into your collecting yard should be as wide as the roadway leading into it, to avoid any cramming, damage or hoof trauma.

The collecting yard should be an appropriate size for your herd with the requirement being 1.5m_²/cow – sharp turns in the yard should also be avoided.

The surface of the yard needs to be non-abrasive but not slippery and should be constantly washed down, cleaning off any loose stones or slurry.

Cows should be calmly brought into the parlour, and if there is a backing gate in place, it should be used to gently push the cows into the parlour and not used to forcibly push them in.