Occurrence of subclinical metabolic disorders on dairy farms in Hungary between 1991-1997

A remarkable increase of annual milk production has been seen in Hungary du ring the last three decades. Due to high milk production, the nutritional d emand of the dairy cows became higher and in many cases the feed intake fai led to meet the requirement of high producing animals inducing metabolic di sorders acid losses. The majority of the losses (decreased milk production, Increased occurrence of lameness, mastitis etc.) were caused by subclinica l cases. During the last 7 years, metabolic profile tests have been perform ed at 130 large scale dairy farms with a total population of 80,000 head of Holstein-friesian cows in order to reveal malnutrition-caused subclinical metabolic diseases. During the 7 years, 5192 dairy cows were sampled select ed randomly from the herd examined, The following groups were tested: I. = 1-2 weeks prior to expected parturition, II. = 1-7 days after calving, III. = 2-3 weeks after calving, IV. = 6-8 weeks after calving (at peak lactatio n), V. = mid-lactation, VI. = heifers, The results of the study are summari sed in Table 1.