Feasibility and acceptance of ready-made standard operating procedures in calf care on German dairy farms

Abstract

Calf loss continues to be a considerable problem on German dairy farms. Untrained personnel or the lack of best practice routines are potential reasons. Standard operating procedures (SOP) may increase process consistency and can improve animal health and animal welfare. We developed SOP for 8 important tasks in calf care and provided them online to interested dairy farmers and their employees. Five questionnaires were embedded to collect data on demographics, use, perception, and feasibility of SOP. Main objectives of the study were to investigate (1) if there is a gap between the existence of SOP and the wish for SOP, (2) if participants (n = 301) consider ready-made SOP as feasible for their farm and (3) suitable to train new personnel, and (4) if they state their confidence in task execution higher after the courses. We experienced a strong discrepancy between the existence (13.1%) and the wish for SOP (69.4%). Most of the participants rated ready-made SOP as feasible for their farm (66.5%). Eighty-five percent fully agreed or agreed to the statement that SOP are a suitable tool for training new employees. Interestingly, 64.2% of employees mentioned, that they wanted to be involved in the creation of SOP specific to their farm. The SOP-based e-learning courses increased the confidence in performing tasks in calf care, especially concerning tasks that were performed less often such as tube feeding, emergency care, and testing of colostrum quality.