Impact of US Brown Swiss genetics on milk quality from low-input herds in Switzerland: interactions with season

Stergiadis, S. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7293-182X, Bieber, A., Chatzidimitriou, E., Franceschin, E., Isensee, A., Rempelos, L., Baranski, M., Maurer, V., Cozzi, G., Bapst, B., Butler, G. and Leifert, C. (2018) Impact of US Brown Swiss genetics on milk quality from low-input herds in Switzerland: interactions with season. Food Chemistry, 251. pp. 93-102. ISSN 0308-8146 doi: 10.1016/j.foodchem.2018.01.077

Abstract/Summary

This study investigated the effect of, and interactions between, US Brown Swiss (BS) genetics and season on milk yield, basic composition and fatty acid profiles, from cows on low-input farms in Switzerland. Milk samples (n=1,976) were collected from 1,220 crossbreed cows with differing proportions of BS, Braunvieh and Original Braunvieh genetics on 40 farms during winter-housing and summer-grazing. Cows with more BS genetics produced more milk in winter but not in summer, possibly because of underfeeding potentially high-yielding cows on low-input pasture-based diets. Cows with more Original Braunvieh genetics produced milk with more (i) nutritionally desirable eicosapentaenoic and docosapentaenoic acids, throughout the year, and (ii) vaccenic and α-linolenic acids, total omega-3 fatty acid concentrations and a higher omega-3/omega-6 ratio only during summer-grazing. This suggests that overall milk quality could be improved by re-focussing breeding strategies on cows’ ability to respond to local dietary environments and seasonal dietary changes.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/74895
Item Type	Article
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Life Sciences > School of Agriculture, Policy and Development > Department of Animal Sciences > Animal, Dairy and Food Chain Sciences (ADFCS)- DO NOT USE
Publisher	Elsevier
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