Dose Response to Recombinant Bovine Somatotropin from Weeks 15 to 44 Postpartum in Lactating Dairy Cows

¹ Animal Science Department, University of Maryland, College Park 20742 and American Cyanamid Company, Princeton, NJ 08540

Forty Holstein cows were used in an experiment to determine the response of cows to daily subcutaneous injections of 0, 10.3, 20.6, and 30.9 mg of recombinant bST. Injections began between 98 and 104 d postpartum and continued for 29 wk, up to 70 d prepartum, or a maximum of 400 d postpartum. Increasing recombinant bST increased milk yield and 3.5% FCM yield in a linear fashion and by 5.2 and 5.7 kg/d, respectively. Milk composition was not changed, and DM intake as a percentage of BW increased from 3.39 to 3.80% with increasing (30.9 mg/d) bST. Feed efficiency (3.5% FCM/DM intake) was increased from 1.35 to 1.64 with increasing dose, suggesting improved efficiency of use of DM intake, primarily by dilution of maintenance. Increasing bST reduced BW gain linearly from .46 kg/d for the control to .22 kg/d for the 30.9 mg/d treatments. Days open tended to be greatest and number of services tended to be higher for cows treated with 30.9 mg/d bST. Calf birth weight, weight of cows at calving, and incidence of metabolic diseases during subsequent calving were not affected by bST. Somatotropin treatment resulted in somewhat smaller increases in milk yield than that reported in previous studies. Long-term health effects and effects on reproduction could not be determined from the relatively few cows used in this study.

Key Words: postpartum dairy cows • somatotropin • dose response

Submitted on November 13, 1989
Accepted on May 14, 1990

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