Technical and productive diagnosis of a commercial dairy farm at the Citrus Fruit Enterprise “Victoria de Girón”

Aliezer Machado González

ABSTRACT
A diagnosis was conducted from January to December, 2007, in a commercial dairy farm belonging to the Citrus Fruit Enterprise “Victoria de Girón”, in order to determine the factors that had incidence on the milk production. The farm has an area of 107 ha, with neither irrigation nor fertilization. The pastures that prevailed are natural, of the non-cultivated species: Paspalum notatum, Paspalum virgatum, Dichantium caricosum and Dichantium annulatum. Paspalum virgatum is the prevailing weed with 58 %, Paspalum notatum, 25 %, Dichantium caricosum 10 % and Dichantium annulatum, 7 %. The milk production was 4,3 and 5,1 for the dry (DS) and rainy season (RS), respectively. During the year the percentage of milking cows was 60 %. The mortality indicator was 3,3 % for adult animals and 4,9 in calves. The birth rate in calves was low (67 %). The empty cows had a variable performance of 8 % at the beginning of the year when the artificial insemination was increased; however, with the use of direct mating without control it increased in 27 %. Throughout the year difficulties emerged in supplying the quantities of complementary feedstuffs due to their scarcity, which caused that the requirements were not covered in some months of the year. The dry cows showed a more critical feeding situation in both seasons. The benefit/cost ratio was 1,26 because no expenses were incurred in the transformations of the pasturelands and their division into paddocks. The results suggest the need to make a transformation of the pasturelands of the farm and to increase the number of paddocks for the cows as well as for the calves.