Good bedding boosts milk production

By Bob Koigi

Nairobi,Kenya; A new breed of farmers keen on improving the living conditions of cows and upping milk yields have invested heavily in cow mattresses.

The bedding are unique rectangular eiderdown made of recycled tyres. This has seen farmers reduce cases of mastitis and even up milk production by up to four litres a day.

It is a relatively new phenomenon in the country, but which is actively practised in the developed countries.

The use of cow mattresses involves lining antiquated stalls lined with coarse sand, sticky dried manure or stinging sawdust that made life uncomfortable for the cows.

Now having been in the country for just a year, the cow mattresses are recording impressive sales.

Increasing sales

Suppliers like Fildana Ltd and Mowning Kenya have increased their sales by about 60 per cent since they first introduced them in the country.

“I think the beauty of it is that farmers use it and experience for themselves the benefits,” said Kariuki Manjala the Marketing manager, Fildana Ltd.

“Most of the farmers, whom we talk to, mostly in open field days, have sufferred losses due mastitis and other diseases as sheds become uninhabitable especially during rainy seasons.”

The mattresses come in different inches are predominantly black in colour.

They are mostly made of recycled tyres, which are then treated with anti-fungal and anti-bacterial solutions.

The cheapest is a two-inch which goes for Sh3,500 while a four inch one goes for Sh7,000. The mattress can only accommodate one cow, but there are unique ones that can accommodate two calves.

Yustas Mwangangi, a livestock farmer in Tala is among the pioneer farmers to purchase the mattresses, having lost two heifers to mastitis. “Veterinarians and livestock officers from the Ministry of Livestock after inspecting my cows complained of the deplorable living conditions the animals were living in,” recalled Mwangangi. “I used to remove the dung in the sheds every morning, but things would become complicated whenever it rained. The mixture of the dung and the rainwater would make the sheds deplorable.”

“But that too would be short-lived. The cows would step on them and with the cow dung, it would just be a matter of time before I was back to square one,” he said.

He would later lose two of his highest milk producing cows in three months to what he learnt to be mastitis, which he says cost him over Sh15,000 to treat.

“The cows could produce up to 15 litres a day and I could pick Sh30,000 every month from just the two of them. I have never recovered from that loss,” he added. Mastitis — an inflammation of the mammary glands and udder tissue, is a major prevalent disease of dairy cattle. It is caused by among others poor housing management.

Milk production

Mwangangi upon learning of the cow mattresses at the Agricultural show last year purchased ten of them for his cows. “They are easier to clean and I only clean them when the cows are grazing outside and lay it to them in the evening.

I have seen huge improvement not just in milk production but in the overall health of the cows,” said Bereta Nyawira another farmer who has purchased three mattresses.

Though her cows haven’t experienced mastitis she says she could tell the cows were restless and tired but couldn’t rest or sleep comfortably.

“Now they appear to be a bit more blissful healthy which ultimately affects the amount of the milk they produce. I don’t know whether there are any other factors but since I got the mattresses, I have noted an increase of up to four litres of milk per day,” she said as one of the cows seated in a mattress lazily chews her feed.

Veterinarians advise farmers to look for alternative bedding for their cows from the traditional twigs and sawdust.

This is due to their ability to harm the cows say the mattress has been the best bedding for animals. They say mattresses not only protects them against diseases like mastitis but also the ‘Dumb Heifer Syndrome’ (DHS)— where cattle repeatedly injure themselves within their stalls, sometimes to the point of death.

“DHS is mostly due to the cows getting angry due to the terrible state of their sheds,” he adds. Think of it this way. If you have been tired the whole day and want to sleep and find your bed either soiled or wet, you will be irritated.

That is the exact reaction of the cows, and in the process of them moving across the shed in anger they might injure themselves.

“We have had such cases where either the cow owner finds their cow dead having strangled themselves or hurt itself. Cows have feelings too,” said Onesmus Awiti a veterinarian in Nairobi.