Social Dominance Effects on

Milk Production, Behaviour,

and Physiological Performance
of Lactating Dairy Cows
Introduction

Feeding &
Social
Resting
Hierarchy
Behaviour

Physiology
 Dairy cattle are gregarious animals that form a strict
Social
social hierarchy through dominance establishment.
Hierarchy
Dominance is associated with higher ranking individuals
having priority of access in the distribution of resources
(Hussein et al., 2016), mainly feed and space.

The cow’s dominance value (DV) can be quantified by

recording social interactions, which is the basic component of
dairy cattle's social rank establishment (Guhl & Atkeson, 1959).

Due to the competitive interaction, lower ranking animals may

suffer greater disadvantages compared to higher ranking animals
that have advantage in winning.
Feeding & Lower ranking cows spent less time feeding, resting and
Resting were less synchronized with others in their feeding
Behaviour behaviour (Ungerfeld et al. 2014; Nogues et al, 2020).

Galindo and Broom (2020) stated that low-ranking cows

spent less time lying and more time standing still and
standing half in the cubicles than middle- and high-ranking
cows.

As time spent standing increased, the number of soft tissue

lesions increased and as total time standing increased the
number of cases of lameness increased.
 Previous study found that agonistic interaction causes social
Physiology stress among herd members which was reflected in the
increased in cortisol level, especially in the lower ranking
animals (Kerley, 2021).

Agonistic interactions among group members also found to have

caused a reduction in milk yield (Hasegawa et al., 1997), and
disruption in reproduction performance (Moberg, 1991).

This leads to the question of whether social dominance affects

the dairy cows’ behaviour, physiological, and production
performance or not, and whether the understanding of the
importance of social dominance can be used to improve the
Malaysian dairy farm grouping management under the feedlot
system.
 Objective
To determine the effects of social dominance on the behaviour, physiological, and
production performance of lactating dairy cows.

Specific Objectives
• To determine the effects social dominance on milk production of lactating dairy cows.
• To study the influence of social dominance on lactating dairy cows’ feeding and resting
behaviour.
• To investigate the effects of social dominance on cortisol, estrogen and progesterone
level of lactating dairy cows.
 Hypothesis
Social dominance affects lactating dairy cows production and influenced their
behaviour and physiological performance.

Specific Hypothesis
• Older and higher producing cow is more dominant than their subordinate herd
member.

• Dominant cows spend more time feeding and resting than subordinate cows.
• Dominant cows have higher concentration of progesterone and estrogen compared to
mid-ranking and subordinate cows.
• Subordinate cows have the highest concentration of cortisol.
Materials and Methods
 Experimental site &
Herd management
Farm Fresh, Farm 16, Universiti Putra Malaysia, Serdang,
Selangor.

50 lactating Friesian × Jersey, multiparous dairy cows

Grouped and managed together under the Farm Fresh

management feedlot system

Mid-lactation phase (DIM = 155 23), ranged between 3.5 to

5.5 years, with average milk yield ranging from 12 to 28
L/day.

Milked twice daily at 0630 and 1830 h. After the milking, all
cows were kept in the same barn and offered feed twice daily.
Behaviour observation
Direct visual observation
0730h – 1330h (6 hours)
Bunting
14 continuous day
After morning feed allocation

Type of behaviour observed:

- Bunting Pushing
- Pushing
- Allogrooming (Phillips, 2002)

Allogrooming
 Table 1. Types of dominance behaviour and its score.
Types of Description Score
behaviour
Swinging or pushing their head in the direction of 4
Bunting the other animals to displace them

Uses part of their body other than the head to 3

Pushing displace another cow
One cow licks the body regions of another cow 1
Allogrooming

Each type of behaviours were given a score depending on the level of intensity of aggression
performed by cows (Sołtysiak and Nogalski, 2010; Table 1).

All observed cases of social interactions indicating dominance and submission between cows were
recorded on a win and loss basis (Beilharz & Mylrea, 1963), using an 'all-occurrences’ sampling method
(Altman, 1974).
 Determining dominance value (DV)
The total win and loss score were plotted onto a master chart (MC) on which was entered
every animal in the herd (Schein and Fohrman, 1955).

From the MC, DV were calculated based on each cow total won or lost interactions, with the
ratio of wins to losses transformed into a normal distribution using the following formula:

DV = sin-1 (Σx/x + y) 1/2

Where x = number of wins, and y = number of losses
(Beilharz and Mylrea 1963; Phillips and Rind, 2002).

Table 2. Social rank based on DV range

Social rank DV range
Dominant 60.0 to 90.0

Mid-ranking 30.0 to 59.0

Subordinate 0.0 to 29.0

Table 3. Average number of win, lost, and total social interactions per cow according to the social
group of dominant, mid-ranking and subordinate.

Average no. of interactions per cow

Social group
Win Lost Total

Dominant 53.4 24.9 78.3

Mid-ranking 33.6 40.2 73.8

Subordinate 13.6 36.9 50.5

Production parameters

Parameter Sampling

Milk yield (L) Recorded manually during morning and evening milking for
7 consecutive days (day 1,3,5,7,9,11, and 13).

Body condition Assessed using a ten-point scale (Roche et al., 2004) during feeding
score (BCS) on the first day of milk sampling.
 Behaviour parameters
• A total of 36 cows that have been attributed DV

• Classified as : Dominant (D; top 12 cows),

Mid-ranking (M; mid 12 cows),
Subordinate (S; bottom 12 cows)

• Used for the feeding and resting behaviour

observational study.

• All 36 cows biodata such as age was then collected

from Farm Fresh management system.
 Behaviour parameters
▪ Observed and recorded for 9 hours between morning and evening milking
(0800 – 1600h) over a period of 7 consecutive days.

▪ Behavioural data were observed by one-zero sampling with a 10 minutes

interval (Mitlohner et al., 2001) using an instantaneous-scan sampling method as
described by Altman (1974).

▪ The cumulative time spent in each activity (except social interactions)

then be calculated, assuming activity recorded occurred over the entire 10
minutes period.
Behaviour parameters

Feeding Ruminating Drinking

Behaviour parameters

Standing Lying
Table 4. Ethogram of the behaviour of interest observed (Phillips and Rind, 2002; Hussein et
al., 2016).
Behaviour Description

Feeding Actively prehending feed with the head lowered.

Ruminating Rhythmic chewing of herbage accompanied by regulars regurgitation of boli

from the rumen.
Drinking Ingestion of water from the water trough.

Standing Maintaining an upright position on extended legs, while ruminating, or

idling.
Lying Lying down in any resting position, while ruminating, or idling.
 Pysiological parameters

1. Collect sample 2. Store sample 3. Centrifuge sample

- Milk samples collected

during the morning - Store the collected milk
- Within 24 hours,
milking session (Day 1). samples at 4˚C
- Centrifuge at 4˚C, 2000
immediately after
rpm for 20 minutes.
- Filled in 15ml labelled sampling.
Falcon tubes.
 Pysiological parameters

4. Separate supernatant 5. Store supernatant 6. Analyse Hormone levels

- Pipette approximately - Analyse using

- Store the labelled 1.5ml
1000μl of clear commercial ELISA kits
tubes at -20˚C for further
supernatant into labelled - Cortisol, Estrogen, and
analysis.
1.5ml tubes. Progesterone
Statistical Analysis

Pearson's correlation coefficient and one-way ANOVA were used to analyse

relationships between DV and all parameters using SAS statistical package
(SAS Institute Inc., 2005).
Results and Discussions
Table 5. Pearson’s correlation coefficient between dominance value and age, body condition
score, and average milk yield/day.
Table 6. Mean and standard error of mean (SEM) of age, days in milk, lactation phase, body conditio
score, and average milk yield (L/day) according to group (D= dominant; M= mid-ranking; S=
subordinate).
• Age was the key factor in determining dominance.

• Higher-ranking cows usually associated with seniority in a social rank due to the
fact that older cows were more experienced in having encounters with other cows
compared to younger cows (Guhl and Atkeson, 1959).

Social dominance and age were found to have positive correlation (Arave and
Albright, 1981; Friend and Polan,1974), in which dominant animals were older
than lower ranking animals (Deniz e al., 2020)
Table 7. The mean and standard error of mean (SEM) for feeding, ruminating, drinking, standing
and lying and resting behaviour according to the social group of dominance (D), mid-ranking (M)
and subordinate (S) cows.
• D cows spent more time ruminating compared to lower ranking
herd members (P = 0.0371).

• Higher ranking animals spent more time ruminating than their

subordinate members (Ungerfeld et al., 2014; Fiol et al., 2018;
Shinde et al., 2004).

• Ruminating behaviour indicates the cow’s resting time and is

known to be the primary determinant in improving the cow’s
liveweight gain (LWG) (Phillips, 2002).
• The higher amount of time spent ruminating by D cows
in this study suggests that higher-ranking cows had the
privilege of resting longer compared to S cows.

• However, there was no significant difference found in

standing nor lying time, to support the result of this
study.
Table 8. Mean and standard error of mean (SEM) of level of cortisol (ng/ml), progesterone (ng/ml), and
estrogen (ng/ml) according to group (D= dominant; M= mid-ranking; S= subordinate).
• No significant different found in the level of
progesterone and estrogen.

• Subordinate cows have higher cortisol level

compared to dominant and mid-ranking cows.

• Plasma corticosterone levels were considerably

greater in submissive individuals than in dominant
individuals (Williamson et al, 2019).

• This indicate that lower ranking animal may

experience social stress caused by agonistic
interactions in the group.
• Social stress prevent the animals from achieving their
optimum production, reproductive and health
performance (Judd et al., 1994; Creel 2001; Galindo and Broom, 2000; Abbott
et al., 2003).

• No significant difference in milk yield found between the

social groups in this study.

• This demand further study to be done on the effects of

social dominance in reproductive and health performance
in lactating dairy cows.
 Conclusions
• In this study, dominant cows are older than their subordinate herd members, with no
differences in milk production nor BCS.

• Dominant had higher ruminating duration indicating longer resting time, compared
to their subordinate herd members.

• Subordinate cows may suffer from social stress indicated by the high cortisol level
compared to the higher ranking cows found in this study.

• Farmers can consider the cows’ social behaviour to be included in their animal
grouping management, to prevent social stress especially in the lower ranking cows.
Thank you
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