New Zealand Paient Spedficaiion for Paient Number £99854
PATENTS FORM NO. 5
Fee No 4 $260 00
PATENTS ACT 1953 COMPLETE SPECIFICATION
After Provisional No 299854
Dated 29 November 1996
James & Wells Ref 22570a/17CJ
METHODS OF AND PRODUCTS FOR IMPROVING ANIMAL HEALTH
WE COAST BIOLOGICALS LIMITED, a New Zealand company of 260 Roscommon Road, Win, Manukau City, Auckland, New Zealand hereby declare the invention for which we pray that a patent may be granted to me/us, and the method by which it is to be performed to be particularly described in and by the following
IV: ' • ' P.-^oity statement ^ -> 0f NZ
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Methods of and Products for Improving Animal Health Technical Field
This invention relates to methods of and products for improving animal health More particularly, it relates to methods of and products for manipulating mineral content of pasture and diet to improve the health of dairy cows after calving It should be appreciated however that this possible application is given by way of example only and is not intended to be limiting
Background Art
It is well known that calcium and magnesium deficiencies lead to milk fever and grass staggers respectively These are common problems in dairy herds, especially in New Zealand Subclinical magnesium deficiency is known to cause up to a 10% reduction in nulk production during lactation As the income of the dairy farmer depends to an extent on the volume of nnlk supplied to collecting agencies, this has an obvious detrimental impact on the farmer income
Milk fever is most commonly due to a failure of a dairy cow to maintain calcium homeostasis, by absorbing more calcium or mobilising sufficient amounts from its ample bone reserves, when there is a sudden increase in calcium requirements for milk or when calving
Rye grass/clover pastures in New Zealand, generally liberally fertilised with potash, have very high potassium levels (2 5 to 5% DM) (dry matter) and hence high DCAD (dietary cation/amon difference) represented e g by [K+Na] - [CI+S] The DCAD values generally range from 300-1000 m equivalent per kg DM New Zealand pastures also often contain insufficient calcium (0 3 to 0 4% DM) or Mg (0 15 to 0 2% DM) for lactating dairy cows Accordingly, the metabolic disorders of milk fever and grass tetany are common m New Zealand, particularly during the winter/early spring period
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To date milking cows have frequently been directly supplemented with magnesium le by drenching in order to attempt to reduce the incidence of tetany and to stimulate milk production (Wilson, 19S1, The Magnesium Status of Grazing Dairy Cows Proc NZ Soc An Prod 41 43-59) Despite this practice, hypomagnesaenna remains a serious problem and thus exacts a toll on both dairy cow health and the profitability of farmers
It would be desirable to devise simple and cost effective methods of and products for improving the health of dairy cows post calving
It is an object of the present invention to address the foregoing problems or at least to provide the public with a useful choice
Further aspects and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the ensuing description which is given by way of example only disclosure of invention
According to one aspect of the present invention there is provided a method of improving animal health post parturition comprising decreasing DCAD (as hereinbefore defined) pre parturition
In a preferred embodiment the present invention may be directed to improving the health of dairy cows, and reference shall hereinafter be made to same However, it will be appreciated that this is given by way of example only
Parturition shall accordingly be referred to as calving
According to a further aspect of the present invention there is provided a method of reducing clinical health problems in cows comprising decreasing DCAD pre calving
Clinical health problems in cows may be any one or more of milk fever, ketosis, assisted calving and retained foetal membrane
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According to another aspect of the present invention there is provided a method of reducing subclinical health problems in cows comprising decreasing DCAD pre calving
Examples of subclinical health problems in cows may be hypocalcaenna, hypomagnesaenna and ketosis
According to another aspect of the present invention there is provided a method of increasing milk production in cows compnsing decreasing DCAD pre calving
Examples will now be given of methods of decreasing DCAD, but it should be appreciated that all means of decreasing DCAD are within the scope of the present invention
A first method of decreasing DCAD in cows is by decreasing plant potassium levels pre calving As discussed above, potash is generally liberally applied to New Zealand pastures However, by decreasing the application of potash to pastures, plant potassium levels are reduced pre calving, thereby decreasing DCAD
A further method of decreasing plant potassium levels pre calving may be by increasing the addition of sodium which is considered antagonistic to potassium
A further method of decreasing DCAD pre calving is by directly feeding cows a substantial proportion of a low potassium feed Examples of low potassium feed are Maize Silage
A further method of decreasing DCAD pre calving comprises feeding anionic supplement to cows
Feeding as used herein may include any one or more methods of supplying nutrients directly or indirectly to cows such as via their water supply, spraying on pasture or as a supplement to foodstuffs such as silage
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Although any appropriate anionic salt mix which has the effcct of reducing DCAD m cows is within the scope of the present invention, it is anticipated that the anionic supplement may primarily comprise the anionic salts, magnesium or NH4 chlorides and sulphates
According to yet another aspect of the present invention there is provided an anionic salt supplement comprising substantially 60% magnesium clilonde, 30% sulphate and substantially 10% NaCl Sodium Chloride
In a preferred embodiment the sulphate may be ammonium sulphate
In a preferred embodiment an anionic mixture may be mixed with water to provide a foliar spray
In a preferred embodiment the abovementioned foliar spray may further include additional minerals such as CI, S and Mg
According to a further aspect of the present invention there is provided a method of inducing pasture uptake of cations comprising the foliar application of anionic salts as hereinbefore exemplified
It is apparent that the methods and products of the present invention have the potential to significantly increase dairy production and alleviate or eliminate a range of health problems presently commonly observed in grazing and dairy cows More specifically, the methods and products of the present invention can be seen to increase magnesium and sodium levels in pasture, decrease potassium levels in pasture, and hold calcium levels, with resulting beneficial effects on dairy cow health post calving
Best Modes for Carrying out the Invention
Experiment 1 - application anionic supplement Hvpoaid™66/34 (The reader is directed to the applicant's New Zealand Patent Application No 280911)
A dairy cow feeding experiment was undertaken at Massey University (July 1955) and a series of pasture plot experiments were conducted on six commercial dairy farms situated on a diverse range of soil types (river accretion, pumices, sandy loam, clay and peat) during May/June 1996
The anionic salt supplement used in the nnlk production experiment was 66% magnesium chloride and 34% sulphate (Hypoaid™ 66/34) 50 mature cows, which were being fed a 50 50 maize silage and pasture ration, were divided into two similar groups and one received 60g Hypoaid™ 66/34 daily, mixed into (8kg DM) maize silage for a period of 2-4 weeks prior to calving Pasture was fed once every 2-3 days when soil conditions allowed grazing The pasture consumed by the treatment group was also sprayed at the commencement of the experiment with 15kg Hypoaid™ 66/34 per ha 20 cows from each group were bled on days 1 or 2, 3 or 4 and 10-12 after calving and again 5-7 weeks into lactation Serum samples were analysed for minerals and B-hydroxybutyrate concentrations
Because of the foliar application of anionic salts in the grazing experiment did not change the DCAD markedly, the effects of including 10% NaCl in the foliar spray (Hypoaid™ 60/30/10) was examined during the subsequent pasture plot expenments Common salt was included because of known antagonistic relationships between Na and K as plant nutrients Replicated (3 or 4, lm square) plots of pastures, yielding 2-3000kg DM/ha, were sprayed with Hypoaid™ 66/34, Hypoaid™ 60/30/10 or distilled water at the rate of lOkg/ha (in 2001 H2O) on six commercial dairy farms
Representative samples of herbage were obtained from each plot after one week and analysed for N, P, K, S, Ca, Mg, Na and CI The DCAD (milk fever) and K/Mg + Ca (grass tetany) indices were calculated for individual properties and treatments
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Results
The cows supplemented with anionic salts (DCAD 165, V250 for controls) rcachcd their peak milk production significantly (P<0 01) earlier than those in the control group (Day 26, v 36) Milk production from the treated cows (Table 1) was higher at the first herd test (day 10-21 of lactation), with the greatest effect being on protein yield (+ 14%) The positive effects were still present at the second test (day 30-50 of lactation), but were not so marked
Serum Ca concentrations in the treatment group were higher over the first week of lactation (9 01 v 8 S4mM) and Mg concentrations from day 12 onwards (0 93 v 0 87mM), but neither of these differences reached statistical significance On the other hand a much smaller proportion of the cows which received anionic salts, compared with the controls, showed hypocalcaemia (3/20 v 8/20), less than 8 OmM) and hypomagnesaenna (S/20 v 12/20, less than 0 6mM) on one or more days m early lactation Penpartum clinical disorders were also lower in the treated group (0 x 1/20 milk fever, 0 v 5/20 ketosis, 0 v 2/20 assisted calvings and 1 v 0/20 with retained foetal membranes, for treated and control cows respectively)
These results which showed that considerable benefits in health and production may result from a reduction in DCAD before calving were probably mediated through enhanced intake Huber et al (1981) showed that hypocalcaemia will cause a reduction in rumen contractions which would potentially delay the establisliment of normal intakes following calving
Experiment 2 - Foliar application of mineral supplements
The influence of a 60/30/10 foliar applied mineral supplement upon the mineral composition of pastures and indices of milk fever (DCAD) and grass tetany
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(K/Mg + Ca), measured one week after application on 6 commercial farms, are summarised in Table 2
Results
The Mg contents of pastures were increased substantially (36%) especially by Hypoaid™ 60/30/10 In fact on the basis of estimated pasture yields for this treatment, recovenes of applied Mg averaged approximately 200%, which implies that the foliar treatment induced Mg uptake from the soils The calcium concentration of the pastures was only marginally increased by the treatments on those soil types Both the milk fever and grass tetany indices were reduced by the Hypoaid™ 60/30/10 treatment, mainly due to lower herbage K concentrations
Table 1 Influence of anionic salt supplementation for 14-28 days prior to calving upon milk production in early lactation
Control
Treatment
SEM
P Value
First test date CDnv 10-211
Milk yield, kg
Milk fat yield, kg
Protein yield, kg
Second test date (Day 30-4D
Milk yield, kg
Milk fat yield, kg
Protein yield, kg
24 2 1 11
0 86
24 9
1 09 0 90
2 1 21
0 98
24 9
1 17 0 92
0 96 0 04 0 03
0 64 0 04 0 03
0 40 0 10 0 02
0 18
Probability values with 22-25 observations per mean
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Table 2 Influence of foliar applied mineral salts upon mineral composition of pasture (%DM), and metabolic disease indices.
Control
Hypoaid 60/30/10
SEM
Cations
Potassium
3 62
3 48
0 35
Calcium
0 49
0 53
0 05
Magnesium
0 22a
0 30b
0 02
Sodium
0 19xz
0 3iyz
0 05
Anions
Nitrogen
3 80
4 28
0 26
Phosphorous
0.39
0 42
0 03
Sulphur
0 36
0 42
0 04
Chlorine
1 23
1 39
0 25
Indices
Grass tetany, K/Mg + Ca
2 22
1 88
0 27
Milk Fever, DCAD
447x
344Y
39 1
* Standard error of mean (6 samples per mean)
Values on same line with different superscnpts (a, b, c, P<0 05 x, y, z P<0 10) are different
It will be apparent from the above given experimental methods and data obtained that formulations of anionic salts and the foliar application of a product as described herein significantly enhance dairy cow milk production and reduce the severeness of health problems generally seen in post calving dairy herds It can be seen that the products of the present invention are easily applied, and that they are of obvious benefit to all involved m dairy production
Aspects of the present invention have been described by way of example only and it should be appreciated that modifications and additions may be made thereto without departing from the scope thereof
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