Hello and Welcome! My name is Dr. Jim Quigley, author of Calf Notes.com and Managing Director of Calf Notes Consulting. Welcome to CMC – Colostrum Monte Carlo, a new educational initiative of the team at Calf Notes Consulting.
Traditional recommendations for passive immunity – also known as successful passive transfer – were for calves to absorb enough immunoglobulin G or IgG to achieve a concentration in the serum of 10 grams per liter at about 24 to 48 hours of age. This recommended was associated with lower levels of neonatal mortality and improved performance when calves grew to calving and during their first lactation.
In 2020, a group of scientists in North America published a study that showed that while mortality was improved when serum IgG was greater than 10 grams per liter, calf morbidity was only improved at higher serum IgG concentrations. This group recommended a different set of targets that included all calves in the herd. This manuscript, authored by Dr. Jason Lombrd of USDA, set a new standard for passive immunity targets and caused a reexamination of traditional colostrum feeding programs.
Unfortunately, most dairy producers don’t consistently measure serum IgG in their newborn calves, so they don’t know if their colostrum feeding programs are achieving the targets set by Lombard and colleagues. That’s why we created CMC. The program is a simulation that predicts the absorption of IgG by calves when fed colostrum in the first day of life. The program is flexible, easy to use, and provides information that no other tool in the industry can provide.
We hope you enjoy CMC. The program is downloaded and run from your desktop and comes with instructions on use, diagnostic tools, and a reporting capability. Importantly, the program’s knowledge base will help you understand the value of assumptions made in the model. Of course, if you have comments or suggestions, the Forum page provides a way to provide feedback. Thanks for stopping by, and enjoy CMC, brought to you by the team at Calf Notes Consulting.
