Food Animal Production Medicine

Rebecca Brotzman DVM

Associate Outreach Specialist for The Dairyland Initiative

    Training:
  • Doctor of Veterinary Medicine School of Veterinary Medicine, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  • Bachelor of Science Department of Dairy Science, University of Wisconsin-Madison

As the coordinator for The Dairyland Initiative, it is my goal to bring Wisconsin dairy farmers and their teams of lenders, builders and consultants together with one common purpose – to make the Wisconsin Dairy Industry #1 in the world for performance and animal well-being. This program, developed by Dr. Nigel Cook and Dr. Ken Nordlund, aims to serve as the guide to welfare friendly dairy cattle housing in Wisconsin. Our web-based resource will help dairy producers make important decisions on their building designs through virtual tours of new facilities, floor plans, and streaming video, and find answers to key design questions, all from the comfort of the farm office. Partnering agricultural lenders and builders also have access to the website to help their clients make good decisions when planning facilities, and contribute their expertise in developing and re-shaping building standards as more performance and financial data are collected and analyzed from participating farms. Our “Cow Comfort Risk Assessment” service will help farm teams make subjective decisions on where to improve facility design.

Previously, I worked as a practicing large animal veterinarian in southeastern Wisconsin, providing medicine, surgery, and production medicine services, primarily to dairy farms. I continue to enjoy working with my family’s Registered Holstein dairy farm in Sheboygan County.

 

   

Publications:

Cook, N, M Jose, R Brotzman, T Bennett, and M Schaeffer. 2008. Comfort Zone-Design Free stalls: Do They Influence the Stall Use Behavior of Lame Cows? J. Dairy Sci. 91:4673-4678.

Brotzman, R and N Cook. May 25, 2008. Heat stress, lameness, cow comfort… all intertwined. Hoard’s Dairyman, Fort Atkinson, WI.

Cook, NB, RL Brotzman, TB Bennett, and K Burgi. 2007. The effect of heat stress and lameness on the time budgets of lactating dairy cows. J. Dairy Sci. 90:1674-1682.

Brotzman, RL, and NB Cook. 2006. Short Communication: Feeding behavior of dairy cows housed in either two or three rows of free stalls. J. Dairy Sci. 89:134-138.

Cook, N and R Brotzman. 2006. Clinical mastitis incidence in Wisconsin dairy herds. Proc. 45th Annual Mtg. of the Nat’l. Mastitis Council. Tampa, FL. 234-235.

Brotzman, RL, PC Hoffman, and LM Bauman. 2006. Utility of Near-Infrared Reflectance Spectroscopy to Predict Nutrient Composition and In Vitro Digestibility of Total Mixed Rations. J. Dairy Sci. 89:2320-2326.

Cook, N, K Nordlund, R Brotzman, G Oetzel. Sept 10, 2004. Getting to the bottom of sore feet. Hoard's Dairyman, Fort Atkinson, WI.