Dr. Dan Faulkner, who has conducted early weaning research, indicates that in their research projects they have dried up early weaned females on pasture or in a dry lot, and both have worked fine. He also stated that their research has not documented any negative relationship between early weaning and udder quality or subsequent milk production. However, he did say that the udder got quite full while females were drying up.
Peak milk production would occur at 70 to 80 days post-calving. If you weaned calves around the time of peak milk production and they had a high potential to milk and teat and udder quality of the females was already less than average, then this might further cause a decline in udder quality.
