# I should have not showed this video to my wife, dairying back in their future?



## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

She's got serious wheels turning in her head, I can see them spinning. I knew she still missed the dairy but I didn't know exactly how much, she's actually intrigued by this milking system. I've already told her how much just one robotic milker cost. She knows our son will never make a living with just beef cows so who knows.

Some of these folks are hard to understand but you'll get the gist of it:


----------



## MFred (Nov 29, 2013)

Saw those a lot when we were in the Netherlands a few years ago. Pretty neat. If I had to milk cows, that's how I would do it. Also automated barn cleaners like those robot vacuums. Kinda takes the work out of it.


----------



## ontario hay man (Jul 18, 2013)

Heres my take on this. Lazy. As far as im concerned milking cows is a twice a day thing. Get up early milk the cows do your day work then milk the cows at night. Grandpa milked 50 cows for years in tie ups. I helped him from the day I could walk to bottle feed babies then started milking when i could reach the pipe right up until he sold out. Herd health is second to none in tie ups because you have to physically look at them a couple times per milking. I dont know maybe im to old school at 25 lol  I saw one of these at the farm show and didnt like it much.


----------



## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

I wouldn't call it lazy, I'd call it smart. My wife started helping milk when was about 8 until her late Dad sold the herd in '03 so she had hands on with the herd for about 30-35 years. There's no way she would go back to getting up at 4:30 and milking and then again at 4:30 in the afternoon. They only milked 2 at time in a pit type milking parlor. The thing monitors somatic cell count, weight of the cow, her complete history, etc. If robots will keep young people on the family farm I say it's a good thing.

Here's a better example, it comes from an elderly dairy farmer that started milking 6 cows by hand and now they have robots. When his SIL said they needed robots he said no way, no how until he saw and operation with them and now he wouldn't have any other way.


----------



## ontario hay man (Jul 18, 2013)

To high tech for me. Im more of a traditional kinda guy


----------



## Bonfire (Oct 21, 2012)

A few dairies around here (3000+ cows) milk 24/7. 30 minutes to sanitize every eight hour shift. Parlor is on a carousel. Ankle bracelets with podometers. Sorts cows to be bred, preg checked or back to the loafing area. Most impressive farming operation I've ever seen.


----------



## Gearclash (Nov 25, 2010)

I myself think that robotic milkers seem to be the best way for a small beginner setup. We put in a new double 8 milking facility in 2007, and for the cost of that a person could have a one robot stall, although it would not handle quite as many cows as a double 8 will. The robotic system would either eliminate the need to constantly schedule help, or be spending too much time yourself milking to get everything else done well (or at all).


----------



## Tim/South (Dec 12, 2011)

Impressive and I like it.

Am I understanding that the cows come in on their own to be milked? If so, that is a new concept to me and one I believe I like.


----------



## Bgriffin856 (Nov 13, 2013)

I love my tiestall and i love milking cows that way. Only problem i see with a robot is they would i assume need upgraded and maintained meticulously.


----------



## ontario hay man (Jul 18, 2013)

Ya and I know a guy that says a cow that wont go in is a BIG PITA. Hes had a few do it to him.


----------



## Bgriffin856 (Nov 13, 2013)

Looked over a pamphlet that came in a dairy magazine that was advertising Leley's new automatic feeder. And the rest of their robotic equipment. That makes auto calf feeder, manure scraper, feed pusher pretty much could have an entire robotic operation


----------



## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

ontario hay man said:


> Ya and I know a guy that says a cow that wont go in is a BIG PITA. Hes had a few do it to him.


When the my wife and her Dad ran the dairy here the cows would fight to get into the milkhouse once they were trained and knew they were going to get feed once they got in there. How would one get a stubborn cow into the robot if she refused? There's no really railings or a chute or anything to funnel her in.


----------



## 8350HiTech (Jul 26, 2013)

Grateful11 said:


> How would one get a stubborn cow into the robot if she refused? There's no really railings or a chute or anything to funnel her in.


You only have to force her in once. Into the trailer leaving the farm. If she's a good cow, someone else will buy her.


----------



## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

WE have a dairy in the area that's milking a few hundred and has at least one robotic milker last I knew, says he will never go back to any other way of milking. Rolling herd average went up as well as herd health. Mastitis has all but been eliminated.


----------



## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

Grateful11 said:


> Some of these folks are hard to understand but you'll get the gist of it:


They weren't hard to understand. A scotsman from Glasgow is hard to understand, the jordie I also met while on holiday was impossible to understand. A proper Englishman can't understand a jordie.

But everything in the video is pretty much what people find to be true here, the robotic milkers work, the cows actually tend to prefer them and they will pay for themselves in short order.

If I was ever get back into dairy, something like the Lely would be a must.


----------



## swmnhay (Jun 13, 2008)

My Vermeer dealer is also a Lely dealer.It's pretty interesting talking with them about it.A robot handles 60 cows.So it takes more for a larger dairy.They were about 180K per robot a couple yrs ago,I haven't asked lately how much they are.They have service guy on call 24/7.


----------



## haybaler101 (Nov 30, 2008)

Their are only 2 ways to run a dairy in my opinion. One, is your typical small family dairy with 60 to 250 cows and ROBOTIC milkers. The other is 1000 cows or more with Hispanic labor and a parlor sized to milk 3x day and operate 20 to 22 hours. I grew up dairying and did the milking twice a day about 363 days out of the year from age 22 to 30 when we sold out. We sold out milking 110 cows and that much time on the job sucks and I have not missed the cows at all. I was not in position to expand to the size needed for Hispanic labor and robots were still pretty much a dream in 2002 when we quit.


----------



## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

When we got out we were milking around 220, a LOT of work. No vacations, holidays and dates were pretty much out of the question.


----------



## GawasFarm (Jul 10, 2013)

I do not have a dairy but I am around it and I have to say Robots are the way to go. They free up so much time that you can actually pay attention to other things while being able to have a day away! I don't see them being lazy unless you are lazy. If you don't have to being milking then you can be looking at all the data the robot compiles for you, or walking the herd for problems. A robot doesn't mean you spend less time necessarily it just means you have time for other things.


----------



## Bgriffin856 (Nov 13, 2013)

Well Im gonna have to do something when my time comes to take over the operation. Gonna have to push the pencil whether to renovate the current setup and possibly add on, put up a bigger silo and add on to the 16 footer maybe put in a stationary tmr mixer to save time on feeding (biggest use of time) and find a good person to milk and pay them well so i can do all the other work. Or build a new barn an put in a robot and use the current facilities for heifers and dry cows and then i would be able to most everything myself. Always looking to make everything a one man operation and more efficient operation.

So much i would do differently if it was my operation......


----------



## Bgriffin856 (Nov 13, 2013)

Bgriffin856 said:


> I hear you there. We milk 50 do everything ourselves no hired help except some hay help. The last girlfriend didn't like my schedule.... oh well her loss not mine. She never understood that if i wasn't there to do the work it wouldn't get done.





mlappin said:


> When we got out we were milking around 220, a LOT of work. No vacations, holidays and dates were pretty much out of the question.


I hear you there. We milk 50 do everything ourselves no hired help except some hay help. The last girlfriend didn't like my schedule.... oh well her loss not mine. She never understood that if i wasn't there to do the work it wouldn't get done. If im not working or eating i just want to rest and sleep


----------



## hillside hay (Feb 4, 2013)

Bgriffin856 said:


> Well Im gonna have to do something when my time comes to take over the operation. Gonna have to push the pencil whether to renovate the current setup and possibly add on, put up a bigger silo and add on to the 16 footer maybe put in a stationary tmr mixer to save time on feeding (biggest use of time) and find a good person to milk and pay them well so i can do all the other work. Or build a new barn an put in a robot and use the current facilities for heifers and dry cows and then i would be able to most everything myself. Always looking to make everything a one man operation and more efficient operation.
> 
> So much i would do differently if it was my operation......


Are you set up on rotational pasture? Those robots appear to be the cats pajamas for that type of operation. Managing the pastures was a full time job in and of itself for us. Lord willing will be again....soon


----------



## Bgriffin856 (Nov 13, 2013)

No not really, only have about 15 acres for the milk cows and that only lasts a month. Have enough for hiefers and dry cows though. That's one thing i want to change mainly cause grazing is cheaper and saves alot of time and labor. We do graze most of the home farm in the fall on third and second cutting that doesn't get mowed. Depending on how much there is it usually last 2-3 months. Also if there are hayfields close enough to the barn that are gonna get plowed we will graze them off before plowing them.


----------



## hillside hay (Feb 4, 2013)

Grazing certainly does save money but can be labor intensive for just a one man show. We had barb wire perimeters and two strand electric portable fences for separating the paddocks. The portables had to be moved every other day and then the old paddock trimmed and drag down the manure. Our cows had trouble staying ahead of the 5 acre pastures during May and June. That left us with about 40 acres that we harvested as haylage and then grazed from late July on. Both sides of the road were utilized and that could make for some hairy situations during crossings even with DOT signage, lights, flaggers, and most obvious 60 Holsteins in the road! I think when we start up again I'm going to look into a tunnel. NY will bear most of the cost as they need to do some culvert repair soon. I believe I just have to buy the larger culvert. Long story short both the cows as well as we enjoyed rotational grazing.


----------



## Bgriffin856 (Nov 13, 2013)

Only 20 acres are on the same side of the road as the barn 5 is woods. Live on a dirt road so crossing cows isn't too bad. Once they get trained it only takes one person. But like to have two people to stand on each side of the cows so if some idiot comes flying down the road they'll hit one of us and not a cow then it'llbe them paying us instead of us paying them.....have had a few close calls...so many impatient people in a hurry to watch tv. Have had a good number of people usually older folks or city folks stop and comment on watching the cows cross and how they don't see that very often. Kinda gratifying.

As for fencing i would put up a permanent perimeter fence and temporary cross fenceing but leave it up till done for the year. Then use the haybine to clip and size the paddocks to use one every day or every milking and have enough so they aren't over grazing and leave no less than 4 inch stubble. Early on they might just be able to keep up grazing to keep from heading. I would still feed corn silage and grain plus a few pounds of dry hay in the barn as well.


----------



## ontario hay man (Jul 18, 2013)

Should have saw the looks we got when we drove a herd of cows through our towns main street. It was priceless.


----------



## Bgriffin856 (Nov 13, 2013)

Never done that Ontario lol. Im sure there are alot of city folks and even some younger generation people that have never seen cows grazing or crossing them to get to pasture. Pastoral to them. I do like seeing cows grazing. Always fun when you first turn them out and watch them kick, romp and horse around they just seem happy


----------

