Earlier studies have shown that musculoskeletal disorders among animal keepers are more frequent than in other occupations. Most of the farms have expanded and the farmers who used to work alone have suddenly become a work manager with several employers. There are only a few studies made on the work environment in dairy farms. Our study is based on a questionnaire and is a part of a project called large dairy herds. The study is based on data from the persons who milk most of the time. The questions they had to answer were about the work environment, musculoskeletal disorders and the psychosocial environment. The results of the survey are presented in diagrams and figures. It was common that the dairy producer themselves answered the questionnaire.

Rekommendationerna för träning under graviditet förespråkar 30 minuter per dag. Elitaktiva kvinnor kan fortsätta sin träning under graviditeten med modifiering av sina träningsrutiner. Syftet mynnades ut i frågeställningarna hur träningsdosen förändras under och efter graviditet och hur snart efter graviditet återupptas träning, samt om det fanns ett samband mellan träningsdos och barnets födelsevikt därtill förekomst av graviditetsrelaterade besvär. Metoden som valdes var en enkätundersökning och enkäterna delades ut vid ett tillfälle till de 100 bäst rankade elitaktiva kvinnor inom en uthållighetsidrott. Resultatet visade att svarsfrekvensen blev 95 %, efter externt bortfall på grund av ej graviditet så analyserades 34 enkäter.

In the dairy production it is necessary to be able to sort cows. Dairy cows are sorted for many different reasons i.e. regrouping into production strings or for treatments i.e. inseminations, pregnancy and health checks, vaccinations or hoof trimmings. One labour saving way of conducting sorting is by using an automatic sort gate.

Dairy farming in Uganda provides a source of food, employment and income. Previous studies have revealed high frequencies of bovine mastitis, a costly disease for the dairy farmer. The aims of this study were to investigate the bacteriological panorama in milk from udder quarters with clinical (CM) and subclinical mastitis (SCM) and to determine the antimicrobial susceptibility in staphylococcal isolates. Further, we intended to establish the prevalence of subclinical mastitis and to investigate some environmental factors and animal properties that might influence the frequency of mastitis. For CM, farmers made contact with the members of this study when recognizing an animal with CM.

Swedish agriculture stands in front of big changes the whole time. As a milking producer you have to adapt and develop the company to these changes and find the best solution. This potential is easy to find if you compare your company with other similar companies. Labour cost is the biggest cost in milking production after the cost for food. Today it is rather easy to measure how many hours per cow different system of cow houses needs, but we do not know so much about how many hours it takes to breed a calf. To learn more about the labour time with the calves during the first time after the calf was born, I made time studies on five different farms with calf hutches, automatic milk system, large calf boxes, and smaller calf boxes with teat buckets.

The objective of this thesis was to get more knowledge before an alternation of generations. In theses I have chose to make two drawings, one for dairy cows and one for cattle rearing. The drawings are made for a future alternation of generations at my parental home in the province Dalarna. The results are made out of educational visits at different farms and literature investigations. Those dairy farms who I visited had different milking system at each farm and the cattle farm I visited had beef production. The farms are placed in the middle and south of Sweden. At 1998 the Swedish Board of Agriculture decided to change the stall breadth and stall length and the result of this is that many farmers had to rebuild their cattle- and dairy buildings or end farming..

Two post milkning teat dips (PMTD´s) were compared in an automatic milking system at Kungsängen Research Farm, owned by SLU (Swedish University of Agriculture) in Uppsala. In the experiment an evaluation system was used where teat condition regarding skin and teat ends was graded according to a scale where 1 was the best score and 5 the worst. The evaluation period was almost six months in total devided into four minor experimental periods. The technician scoring the teats did not know which PMTD that was currently used. Statistical analysis showed a significant difference between the two PMTD´s regarding teat skin condition, but not regarding teat ends.

Distillers? grain is a by-product of ethanol production. Corn, wheat and barley are the grains that are generally used in the distillery process. Distillers? grain is rich in protein and phosphorus.

Småskalig mjölkproduktion är ett system som främjar regelbundna inkomster och spelar en viktig roll för att minska fattigdomen, ger anställningsmöjligheter och skapar välfärd samt säkrar en näringsrik livsmedelsförsörjning. Det finns cirka 2500 småskaliga mjölkbönder i Zambia men deras kunskap om bra mjölkningsrutiner och hygien är ofta dåliga. Bra skötselrutiner och mjölkningshygien är viktigt för att uppnå en god juverhälsa och mjölkproduktion, och för att inte förorena mjölken. Subklinisk mastit är en vanlig sjukdom bland mjölkkor, som medför förändrad sammansättning av mjölken och minskad mjölkproduktion vilket orsakar stora ekonomiska förluster. Syftet med denna studie var att undersöka skötselrutinerna, med fokus på mjölkningen, hos småskaliga mjölkbönder i tre olika områden i södra Zambia samt att undersöka om det fanns något samband mellan skötselfaktorerna och juverhälsan (subklinisk mastit).

För att underlätta vidareutvecklingen av dagens programvara har jag fortsatt att utveckla den simuleringsmiljö som redan finns på företaget idag för en av produkterna som används vid mjölkning. Simuleringsmiljön skall underlätta utvecklingen av större system för större gårdar. Det som systemet hjälper till med är just uppsättningen av en gård med ett visst antal kor och ett visst antal mjölkningsmaskiner. Den tidigare miljön var skriven i MFC men för att möta morgondagens krav har denna blivit omskriven till C# .NET med hjälp av Windows Forms. Det program jag skrev först använde sig av C++/CLI vilket var väldigt krångligt att använda, det resulterade i att jag helt och hållet gick över till C# .NET.

Mastit är en sjukdom som leder till stora problem i svenska mjölkkobesättningar. De flesta mastiter är subkliniska inflammationer som ofta inte upptäcks på grund av avsaknaden av synliga sjukdomssymtom, men där SCC är förhöjt och mjölkkvaliteten försämrad precis som vid klinisk mastit. Detta leder till att mjölk med förändrad sammansättning och kvalitet levereras till mejerierna som därmed har sämre förutsättningar att framställa mejeriprodukter av hög kvalitet. Även lantbrukaren drabbas ekonomiskt, dels på grund av att ett förhöjt celltal inte ger maximalt betalt för mjölken och dels på grund av en minskad mjölkmängd då all mjölk från kor med konstaterad subklinisk mastit ofta kasseras. Vid mjölkning i automatiska mjölkningssystem finns möjlighet att separera mjölken på fjärdedelsnivå redan vid mjölkning, detta sker dock inte idag.

Nötcenter Viken is a Swedish nucleus herd for dairy cattle. The goal for the farm is to select suitable mothers for the next top generation of bulls. Today the selection for udder health is based on a pedigree index and phenotype data. The pedigree index is based on the cow?s father and grandfathers breeding values.

Research where personality in animals is studied is becoming more and more common. In this area there are different concepts like behavioural syndrome and animal personality and they usually talk about consistency in behaviour over time and situations. This consistent individual behaviour can be used as an indicator of how individuals can handle and adjust to new situations in the environment. Because of this, personality studies in animals are very important in animal welfare. In this study personality in dairy cattle in lose housing were studied.

Concentration of protein in bovine milk is one of the most significant milk quality parameters, to a large extent determining the price for milk to the producer. Mastitis is a common disease among dairy cows, negatively affecting not only milk yield but also milk protein composition. Milk from mastitic cows tends to have lower cheese yield, negatively affected processability properties and sensory quality, due to changed protein quality and composition. Poorer milk protein quality would have an economically negative impact on dairy industry. Only few studies have investigated the short term effects of mastitis on milk protein composition.

SUMMARY By altering the longitudinal slopes of the cubicle floors the drainage could be improved. If the altered slopes also position the cows further back in the cubicles the effect could be cleaner lying surfaces. In result this would lead to lower labour requirements, cleaner cows, cleaner udders and a minimization of the risks of mastitis. However, if the altered slopes lead to that the cows position themselves more diagonally in the cubicles the positive effects could be reduced. The altered slopes could even have a negative influence on the animals? natural lying behaviour.