Many producers also like to separate the first lactation cattle so that they can be more closely monitored during early lactation and then regroup them into production groups as they near mid lactation. This will help prevent several health problems associated with obesity. Grouping herds by production also can result in efficient use of the milking parlor since groups should milk out more uniformly. Also, the reproduction checks, breedings and pregnancy checks will tend to be concentrated in the higher production groups, thereby increasing the efficiency of both veterinarian herd health checks and routine reproductive checks. Disadvantages include high labor requirements, the potential for cows selecting only certain portions of their total diet, and the difficulty of using baled hay.
Many producers feed some or all of the daily grain allotment in the milking parlor.
This practice allows grain feeding to be mechanized and makes individual cow feeding possible. However, time spent in the parlor is short and might limit the quantity of grain a high-producer could consume. Feeding grain in the parlor requires more equipment and causes more dust, increased defecation and slower exit times. Allowing the cow to consume her total grain allotment could slow the milking operation considerably. When feeding grain in the parlor, the number of feedings per day is obviously limited to the number of times cows are milked.