Record keeping is a necessary element of good dairy management. With no written records, farmers have to depend on their memory while making decisions regarding their farm practices. Record keeping starts from Birth till death .

1. Advances in Record keeping system in Dairy
Farms
Submitted by
Shwetali N. Prajapati
Ph.D
Animal Biotechnology
Submitted to
Dr. Mukesh Bhakat

2. What is record
It is simply to collect relevant information that can help you to
take good decisions and keep track of activities like growth,
identification, reproduction, production (milking ), health,
feeding, performance of animals, economic development,
or any activity of farmer or veterinarian .

3. Farm records are like the progress report cards students get at school.
 Record keeping is a necessary element of good dairy management.
 With no written records, farmers have to depend on their memory while making
decisions regarding their farm practices.
 But, memories can become unreliable after a few days, months or years.
 Therefore, no matter how good someone’s memory is, it has no substitute for having
recordings of information on different aspects of the dairy farm.
 Record keeping starts from Birth till death .

4. Importance:-
• Provide the basis for tracking & evaluating performance.
• Provide up to date information for decision making at different level and aspects of the
farm.
• Helps in overall better supervision and management of herd.
• Helps in determining the income and expenditure (economics) of dairy farm.
• Helps in estimating the cost of milk production.
• Helps to compare the herd performances in different years
• Helps to identify problems/gaps and setting future goals/directions for the farm.
• Inform farmers about strengths and weaknesses in their farm operation.
• To Provide Data for Government Administrative and Extension Purposes.

5. Criteria for good record keeping
• Record keeping systems must be simple.
• Records must be useful.
• Records must be kept in such a form that they can be easily converted into information.
• Duplication must be avoided as much as possible.
• Records must lead to actions being taken.
Many types of software for data recording are available in market, But currently are too costly
like Bertha, NEDAP, AFIFARM.
Simple effort for keeping data in Register only can facilitate better management and can
improve farm profit.

6. TYPES OF RECORD KEEPING IN
DAIRY FARM

7. 1.Animal Identification/history record
• Animals may be identified by their name or a number .
• Identification systems may be either temporary or permanent.
• Ear tags, neck chains and ankle tags are usually temporary,
hot brands, freeze brands, tattoos, and photographs are Permanent marks.
What need to be recorded:-
Animal Name or identification number, date of birth/purchase, breed type, calving period
(month), lactation period (days) for each lactation, lactation yield (average per day and total
yield), date of drying, calf its sex & identification number, age when culled, date of disposal
(sales/death).
Purpose:-
• Determining whether an animal is an appropriate size for its age.
• Help to know the age at which a heifer should be targeted for breeding.

8. 2. Financial Recording
Financial records consider total costs of production (expenditure records) including costs of
equipment, land, worker’s payment, farm facilities and Sales record.
What need to be recorded:-
Financial records include dairy farm asset, income/revenue, expenditure and sales records.
Purpose:-
• Providing the farmer with information concerning the profitability of his/her farm.

9. 3. Breeding Record
What need to be recorded:-
Animal identification number/ name, birth date, name of sire and dam, heat dates, calving
dates, earliest breeding date, service information, pregnancy examination, expected calving
date, drying off date and any additional remarks.
Purpose:-
To improve his/her breeding management by:-
the date at which to dry a cow off; knowing when a cow should deliver a calf; highlighting
poor insemination or bull services; establishing breeding dates and feeding programs;
identifying calf, sire and dams; and determining the date for pregnancy testing.

10. Artificial insemination register :-
• AI performed at particular day is fed in it with details of semen dose.
• It helps in maintaining service record and semen dose requirement.
• AI register mentions
1) Animal ID 2) Date of AI 3) semen dose details 4) remarks on status of animal.

11. 4. Milk Production Record
• Include individual cow milk yield per day and include pounds of milk, fat percentage,
protein percentage and somatic cell count.
• These records are useful in measuring the performance of the herd and any diseases in
cow.
What need to be recorded:-
Milking cow name or ID number, daily milk yield, and start & end lactation period/date.

12. 5. Feed & Feeding Record
Two types of records can be kept: The first is about feed production & purchase and the
second is about feeding.
Feeding records give information about the amount, type and quality of the feed provided to
dairy animals.
Purpose:
• used both for day to day management and adjustment of the feed ration.
• provide information on the proportion of feed produced and purchased.
• it can be used to adjust if a milking cow needs more concentrate.
What need to be recorded:-
For feed production/purchase – Type of feed, quantity of feed, purchased feed price.
For Feeding:- Dairy cattle identification, Feed type, quantity of feed intake.

13. 6. Health Records
Include all vaccinations, treatments, all diseases the animal has had.
7. Record of Agricultural Inputs
Used to keep track of all agricultural inputs such as fertilizers, seeds, minerals and etc.
8. Daily Farm Records
These are the records of all important daily activities and events that happen on the farm.
9. Records of Farm Implements and Equipment

14. METHODS

15. There are variety of methods, from a basic manual (hand) record-keeping method to an
elaborate computerized system.
1.Manual (Hand System) :-
• These are card files or individual cow record charts, tags, color coding, manuals and record
books.
• kept in a filing tray or folder for ease of portability and field use.
• These charts provide written history of the animal’s growth, health and vaccinations,
breeding and sire information used, calving's, and milk production records.

16. • Color coded file signals may be attached to the top of the chart recognition of the animal’s
status.
• A milking book should be used for a milk record and insemination book to register
breeding data.
 Disadvantage :- In a manual recording system, it is usually time consuming and tedious to
find important data and to make any decisions.
 Advantage :- This system is usually applicable in small herd size farms where records can
be written by hand easily.

17. 2. Computerized Record-Keeping System
• A computer allows the dairy producer to have management reports available for an
individual cow, a group of cows or the herd.
• These reports then allow the quality and effectiveness of management to be
improved by using information in a condensed form.
• These management reports should cover all areas of herd management, including
production, nutrition, reproduction, inventory, replacements, financial and health.

18. • Dairy management software which can be categorized into three different types:
a simple event and record display program, a fully-featured management program and
an integrated management program.
 A simple event and record display program is designed to just keep and view the
records.
 The fully-featured management program, does not only keep records, but also
analyzes them.
 The integrated management program, is a full featured management program that is
incorporated with real time sensors and monitors such as milk flow meters and feeding
systems.
• These sensors and monitors then send the information about milk production and
feeding patterns of individual cows or herd to the recording system.

19. E –based record keeping Techniques
• There are number of available specialized software systems in the market like Cattle
Manager, Cattle Works, Cattle Max, DeLaval ALPRO, eRanch, Stockeeper03 etc.
• But they are very costly and only a few software support in India.
• A cheaper alternate to such specialized software's is MS-Access as it is easily available and
its cost is lesser.

21.  In India efforts have been initiated to design herd management software at the CIBR,
Hissar and at TANUVAS ,Chennai .
 RFID (Radio- Frequency Identification) is another system integrated with these software
for precise identification and tracking of animals thus, contributing to make them more
efficient.

22. INAPH (Information network for animal productivity and
health )
• It is an application started by NDDB, that facilitates capturing of real time reliable data
on animal breeding(AI ,Calving ,pregnancy diagnosis) , animal Nutrition, veterinary
laboratory and health service (Deworming ,vaccination, disease testing ,first aid ) delivered
at farmers doors.
• Tracking of animal and disease outbreak & disease pattern for different
species/breed/village/district.

23. • Assess the efficiency & effectiveness of AI services & Ration Balancing Advisory
Services.
• Monitor and follow up genetic improvement programs ( progeny testing and pedigree
selection )
• The main objective is to improve genetic potentials of animals with respect to milk
production, milk components such as fat, lactose, protein, somatic cell count, fertility
,health .

25.  the main reasons for the lack of usage are due to the cost of buying the system which is
expensive, complexity of the program, and the level of computer literacy.
applied in large
dairy farms
printing the
reports more
easily
handling huge
data
Large information
to be summarized
more easily
Importance :-

26. Pull SMS Services
• NDDB has started Pull SMS Services for INAPH application .
• Pull SMS will be used by farmers, field users to avail information by sending SMS in a
particular format to a number 9601336677 with a predefined keyword to a long code and
Tag ID ( e.g. NDDB OWN <Animal Tag ID> ) to get the owner information ,get the
response through SMS on his mobile in English language.
• By this service we can get owner information, animal detail, artificial insemination
details, calving details, milk recording details, check inbreeding for given animal .

27. Conclusion
 Record keeping is a necessary element of good livestock business management.
 The first officially recognized recording system in dairy farm was started when milk
recording organizations were formed in Denmark in 1895.
 E-base record keeping make farmers /dairy managers life easier, by using software all
information is automatically collected, arrange, analyzed and stored for future use .
 By electronic records farm can be efficiently managed .
 we can prevent economic loss and make the business profitable and save labour, time and
can increase milk production by efficient utilization of feed .