Life Sciences Commons^™

Selecting Linear-Score Distributions For Modeling Milk-Culture Results, H. G. Allore, David J. Wilson, H. N. Erb, P. A. Oltenacu

Animal, Dairy, and Veterinary Science Faculty Publications

The data for this cross-sectional retrospective study are from surveys of 65 dairy-cattle herds in central New York, USA sampled between February, 1993 and March, 1995. The objective was to identify probability distributions of logarithmically transformed somatic-cell counts (linear score) for use in a simulation model of mastitis and milk quality. Probability density functions were estimated using maximum-likelihood estimators for the linear score of individual-cow composite milk samples culture negative and culture positive for the pathogens Streptococcus agalactiae, Streptococcus non-agalactiae, Staphylococcus aureus, and coagulase-negative staphylococci for the complete dataset and by bulk-tank somatic-cell count group (< 500 000, ≥ 500 000 SCC/ml). Based on the rankings of three goodness-of-fit tests (Anderson-Darling, Kolmogorov-Smirnov and x^{2 …}