Epidemiologic and genetic analysis of veterinary data of German Brown cattle]

In totally 3740 cows of the breed German Brown Swiss distributed over 115 herds risk factors for the occurrence of diseases were analysed using a threshold model. Disease data were recorded by ten practitioners in southern Bavaria. The most frequent diseases were fertility disorders, followed by metabolic, udder and calving disorders. The influence of the herds could demonstrated clearly for all diseases analysed. The effect of the lactation number contributed significantly to the frequency of milk fever, mastitis, retained placenta, endometritis/metritis and ovary cysts. Heritability estimates vary between h2 = 0.5% and h2 = 4.2% with exception of anestrus/acyclia (h2 = 8.8%). With higher milk yield of cows the disease frequencies increase, especially fertility diseases. However, increasing herd milk yield is associated with decreasing disease frequencies. A depression of A.I.-parameters and an increase of culling rate caused by diseases could be observed. In the case of the occurrence of uterus- and ovary disorders days open are elongated by 58 days in comparison to cows without diseases. Recording of disease data for use in electronic data processing seems necessary, in order to diminish production diseases by breeding and herd control programmes. An important prerequisite in organization of disease data recording is an efficient cooperation between the veterinary practitioner, farmer, inseminator and the official milk recording organisation.