I was watching cows go through the robots as I was completing an initial farm visit last December. My mind wandered, and I started calculating how many extra milkings you get from a robot if you can save 10 seconds per milking? I did the math in my head with some conservative values. At 155 milkings per robot per day, saving 10 seconds per milking yields 1550 seconds per day. With a 6 ½ minute milking duration, 1550 seconds is about 4 milkings. What would 4 extra milkings per robot mean in your barn?
I was reminded of this last weekend as I caught up on some episodes of 30 Minutes: Robotic Milking Edition. 3 back-to-back episodes featured farms that were over 100 pounds per cow at the time they were on the program – Episode 14 - Merryville Dairy in Eastern Minnesota; Episode 15 - Horsens Dairy in Northeast Wisconsin; and Episode 16 - Minglewood Dairy in Northwest Wisconsin. Each of these elite dairies stressed a specific thing they do to save time in the pen and avoid interfering with cow flow.
Merryville shared that the barn is bedded without machinery, so cows can stay in the pen while bedding is added. They plan to add a bedding robot to save labor and reduce interference even more.
Horsens explained that they have a double wide footbath which they push cows through when feed is dumped. Both the design and the procedure get cows through the footbath quickly so they can get back to the eating, milking and resting that make milk.
Minglewood uses their sort pens almost every day so that management tasks can be completed away from the rest of the herd. Synch protocols, vet checks, foot trimming and breeding are all done in the special needs pen, which means the rest of the cows can keep coming to the robot without interference.
Making every minute count is part of the recipe for top production on these 3 dairies. It is still possible to achieve high production with retrofit facilities that lack sort pens, with manure systems that are not adapted to scrapers, and with bedding systems that require bringing equipment into the pen. In your barn, you still may have an opportunity to gain extra milkings 10 seconds at a time. A few seconds from singeing udders; a few more seconds from indexing stalls correctly; dispense feed for a clean bowl at the end of milking to get the last few seconds, and you have gained 4 milkings. Cow Corner can help you find the 10 seconds and 4 milkings in your system.
By the way, if you have not watched 30 Minutes: Robotic Milking Edition, I recommend it. Jim Salfer and Marcia Endres, from the university of Minnesota, host monthly interviews with robotic dairies from all over the United States – and a few dairies outside our borders. Watch the live program on the 3rd Thursday of every month at 11:30 central time. If you miss that, as I often do, search for recorded episodes on YouTube.
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