Expert Interview: Managing gut health in high-producing dairy cows

As part of our Expert Interviews series, we met with Mike Steele, Research Scientist at the University of Guelph (Canada), to discuss a critical topic: digestive challenges in high-producing dairy cows during the transition period and effective management strategies.

Watch the video to get practical insights and answers from a nutrition expert!

Why is taking care of the total digestive tract crucial to ensure that high producing cows express their full genetic potential?  

Well, firstly, the gastrointestinal track is really important for absorbing and as well as digesting nutrients. In addition, it’s a barrier to diffusion from the gut into circulation. It’s really critical to have a very healthy gut, not just the rumen and the fore stomach, but also the lower gut, the small and large intestine, in order to get more nutrients absorbed. It also ensures a stronger barrier to reduce inflammation.

What is the link between inflammation and early stage lactation performance? 

If we have cows with high inflammation and they can’t get rid of this inflammation quickly, they’re going to have chronic diseases in early lactation.  This is why we want to do everything we can to minimize inflammation in early lactation.

Inflammation comes from stress. It can be gastrointestinal disorders or abrupt dietary changes. But it can also be an important change in their environment, or a really rough calving or mastitis, stress can come from many different places.

We have to do everything we can to minimize stress and try to resolve inflammation quickly in early lactation.

How can a farmer decrease inflammation?  

Decreasing inflammation can come from many different areas.  Myself, I focus on the gastrointestinal tract. We look at ways of adapting the diet from a dry cow diet to an early lactation diet to minimize what we call leaky gut.

However, inflammation can come from everywhere. Stress from the cows’ environment, moving their environments and pens frequently, an infection of the uterus or even the mammary gland.  It can all contribute to inflammation.

Thus, we have to take care not only of the nutrition, but also of the environment of the animal during the transition period in order to minimize inflammation.

How can intestinal health issues be detected on farms? Is it easy to identify?

It’s very challenging to detect intestinal health issues on farm.

One way that you could look at is to look at the fecal matter of a cow and see if it’s bubbly.

That’s an indication of bypass starch, which could cause inflammation in the lower gut.

However, it’s very challenging even experimentally, to determine if a cow is suffering from an intestinal disorder. A lot more work needs to be done in this area.

What feeding strategies can help improve gut health, particularly during transition period?  

Making sure that you adapt the diet properly. In early lactation, we can feed fresh cow diets, which can include specific additives to improve overall health, but also having a gradual transition and even looking at the fermentability of the diet.

Slower fermentation and early lactation appear to have a benefit to the rumen and the cow throughout its entire lactation.