Study on the behaviour of Holstein cows during milking

The aim of this study was to analyse the milking temperament of 382 cows of the Holstein cattle breed reared in two farms on the territory of Southern Bulgaria. The study was performed in two consecutive years: 2023 and 2024. It included cows in their first to fifth lactation whose behaviour was assessed between 40 and 160 days after the beginning of lactation. The cows were milked either in a herringbone milking parlour or with a central milk pipeline and their temperament was rated in a scale from 1 to 5 according to the scoring system. The temperament of the Holstein cows in the current study have an average score of 2.55 ± 0.10. The highest parameter variation was observed in cows at the first lactation – 3.34 ± 0.13. The observed trend indicated that with each consecutive lactation, the cows milking temperament became calmer in either of used milking technologies. A score of 1 and 2 have been assigned to 22.89% of the cows at the first lactation. The milking technology did not have a significant effect on the parameter examined. The father (p < 0.05) and the lactation number (р ˂ 0.001), on the other hand, had a significant effect on the temperament of the Holstein cows. Keywords: Holstein, temperament, milking parlour, central pipeline