DOI: 10.25338/b8wk9t
title: Data from: Limit feeding TMR exacerbates intersucking in year-old dairy heifers

description: Limit feeding is a practice that is used to improve feed efficiency and
 control growth in dairy heifers, but also has negative consequences
 associated with hunger and restriction of feeding behavior. One such
 consequence could be intersucking (i.e., the licking or sucking of another
 animal’s teats or udder). This behavior is reported to varying degrees in
 heifers, and thus, our first objective was to evaluate whether
 intersucking increased in response to short-term (48 h) feed restriction.
 Intersucking interventions, such as nose rings, are often applied to
 specific animals, and so our second objective was to describe intersucking
 performance in individual heifers, including those that represent outliers
 in this population. We studied 42 heifers (9 Jerseys, 33 Holsteins) aged
 12.8 ± 1.1 mo (mean ± SD). They were housed in 21 pairs, the experimental
 unit for our first objective. We used a switchback design with 3 periods
 of 2 d each where heifers were fed ad libitum total mixed ration in the
 first and third periods (Baseline and Return, respectively), and
 limit fed to 50% of ad libitum intake in the second period (Restriction).
 We scored time spent intersucking continuously and eating at 5-min
 intervals from video recordings from 0800 to 2000 h on 4 d (baseline d 2,
 restriction d 2, return d 1, and return d 2). Heifer pairs spent less time
 eating (16 ± 0.4% mean percentage of 12-h observations ±
 SE), more time intersucking (27 ± 7 s/12 h), and engaged in
 longer bouts of intersucking (23 ± 5 s/bout) on Restriction d 2 compared
 with all other days (eating: 34.7 ± 1.1%, 44.2 ± 0.9%, 35.8 ± 1.1% of
 12-h; intersucking time: 7 ± 2, 7 ± 3, 10 ± 5 s/12 h; intersucking bout
 length: 3 ± 1, 2 ± 1, 3 ± 1 s/bout; Baseline d 2, Return d 1, Return d 2,
 respectively). There was no difference in the number of bouts of
 intersucking across days (1.3 ±0.2 bouts/12 h). The drop in eating during
 feed restriction was followed by a rebound on Return d 1 before returning
 to baseline levels. Time spent intersucking did not differ among ad
 libitum periods. Overall, 90% of the heifers performed intersucking on at
 least 1 of the 4 d, and did this for 1 to 127 s/12 h (range) in 1
 to 13 bouts/12 h. Of the heifers that intersucked, 55% did this at extreme
 levels relative to the rest of the experimental population (outliers).
 Solid feed restriction exacerbated intersucking in year-old heifers, but
 this behavior was widespread.
description: The methods are described in the associated research
 publication. 
description: # Data from: Limit feeding TMR exacerbates intersucking in year-old dairy
 heifers [Access this dataset on Dryad](https://doi.org/10.25338/B8WK9T)
 Data were collected from 42 pair-housed dairy heifers (Jerseys, n=9;
 Holsteins, n=33) that were approximately 13 mo old to evaluate whether
 intersucking was affected by solid feed provision. Heifers were fed an
 ad-libitum total mixed ration (TMR) for 2 d ("Baseline"), then
 restricted to 50% of their previous intake for 2 d
 ("Restriction") before being returned to ad-libitum TMR for 2 d
 ("Return"). Heifers were observed from 08:00-20:00 in each
 period for time spent intersucking and eating. Intersucking was scored
 continuously, while eating was scored at 5-min scans. Heifers were tested
 in 5 total cohorts of 4-5 pairs of heifers per cohort. ## Description of
 the data and file structure * *Intersucking and eating data.xlsx*; This
 file presents data from all 42 heifers ("ID" column) and
 identifies them as Jerseys or Holsteins ("Breed" column).
 Behavior was scored from 08:00-20:00 on Baseline d 2, Restriction d 2,
 Return d 1, and Return d 2 ("Experimental period" column). *
 *"Eating" sheet*; This sheet presents proportion of observations
 spent eating from 08:00-20:00 on each of the 4 d (column “Experimental
 period”). Eating was scored at 5-min intervals. In the manuscript and
 figure, these results are converted to percentages to improve readability.
 * *“Intersucking” sheet*; This sheet presents total time (s), number of
 bouts, and bout length (s) intersucking from 08:00-20:00 on each of the 4
 d (column “Experimental period”). 0s indicate that heifers did not perform
 the behavior. Intersucking was scored continuously. * *“Cohort and pen
 info” sheet*; This sheet provides information about cohort and pen number
 for all heifers. These values indicate unique pairings when combined, and
 are used in the .Rmd file to collapse individual-level data into pair
 averages. * *Supplemental Table and Figure.pdf*; This PDF includes 1 table
 and 1 figure. * *Supplemental Table S1*. This table includes raw means,
 SE, and 95% CI for intersucking and eating, along with model outputs. *
 *Supplemental Figure S1*. This is a photo of the total mixed ration (TMR;
 alfalfa, almond hulls, cottonseed, corn, barley, beet pulp) fed to
 year-old heifers. * *Intersucking and eating models and figures.Rmd*; This
 RMarkdown file uses the .xlsx file listed above to build and validate
 models to describe effects of feed availability on time spent eating and
 intersucking, describe individual performance of intersucking, and produce
 the figures presented in the manuscript. The Rmd file can be downloaded
 and run in R, and is annotated. * *Intersucking and eating models and
 figures.pdf*; This file is the PDF output of the corresponding RMarkdown
 file, and includes the code and output previews. This file is annotated.
 ## Code/Software All analyses were run in R using RStudio. Software
 versions, including those for all packages used, are included in
 *Intersucking and eating models and figures.Rmd* and the associated PDF
 export.