CATTLE SHEDS

[jackyoung123123]

Could we please have pictures of your suckler/beef cattle sheds/setup for inspiration and to help decide and design what type of shed i want to put up!

 

[Far Gloss]

Could we please have pictures of your suckler/beef cattle sheds/setup for inspiration and to help decide and design what type of shed i want to put up!

My shed it’s fairly standard really, I’m using all five bays now. It’s 50’ wide, 75’ in length and 18’ to eves.
I scrape along the feed barrier every other day, which saves on a fair bit of straw

 

[Hilly]

The bedded area is 3` below where they standing, in a wet winter i dont have to muck them out at all, the scrape passage is 13` wide and save s a lot of straw it holds 80 cows n calves and two bulls.

 

[jackyoung123123]

View attachment 606368
My shed it’s fairly standard really, I’m using all five bays now. It’s 50’ wide, 75’ in length and 18’ to eves.
I scrape along the feed barrier every other day, which saves on a fair bit of straw

what are your cattle being fed hay? is there manure fairly solid, we have been feeding our sucklers on hay and they are still having lose manure, theyve been wormed been tested for BVD and all the other virous that can cause this but still have lose manure, we are considering slats

 

[jackyoung123123]

View attachment 606380The bedded area is 3` below where they standing, in a wet winter i dont have to muck them out at all, the scrape passage is 13` wide and save s a lot of straw it holds 80 cows n calves and two bulls.

when you say you dont have to muck them out im guessing you mean the bedded area. how often do you scrape the scrape passage way, is it usally slurry or solid manure that is in this passage way and do you have a slurry tank or just a general muck pit that you scrape it to?

 

[Hilly]

when you say you dont have to muck them out im guessing you mean the bedded area. how often do you scrape the scrape passage way, is it usally slurry or solid manure that is in this passage way and do you have a slurry tank or just a general muck pit that you scrape it to?

clean passage every 3rd day give or take, yea i have an above ground store for another shed with 100 cubicals so i had somewhere to put the slurry.

 

[jackyoung123123]

clean passage every 3rd day give or take, yea i have an above ground store for another shed with 100 cubicals so i had somewhere to put the slurry.

yours is the type of shed im looking for, i currently have no muck pit or slurry store, what would you recommend? personally i like the idea of an underground tank beneath the scrape passage way and have at one end have a hole in the ground, gated off so cattle cannot fall in it, i think this idea may work better than slats and may be a lot cheaper i would have a safety gate like this to scrape underneath it

 

[Far Gloss]

what are your cattle being fed hay? is there manure fairly solid, we have been feeding our sucklers on hay and they are still having lose manure, theyve been wormed been tested for BVD and all the other virous that can cause this but still have lose manure, we are considering slats

All I can think of is that you hay is high in protein, perhaps get that quality tested, if you haven’t already

also are they having any beef nuts?
I find beef nuts make my cattle have loose dung.
We are looking into a slatted shed, I started a thread on it yesterday.

 

[jackyoung123123]

All I can think of is that you hay is high in protein, perhaps get that quality tested, if you haven’t already

also are they having any beef nuts?
I find beef nuts make my cattle have loose dung.
We are looking into a slatted shed, I started a thread on it yesterday.

no they havent had any nuts, they are just having hay, it is first cut

 

[Far Gloss]

no they havent had any nuts, they are just having hay, it is first cut

Mine are having bale silage this winter, as I never managed to make any haylage. I got the weather wrong and had to bale the grass up on a hurry.
The slurry gate pictured earlier looks good.

 

[jackyoung123123]

Mine are having bale silage this winter, as I never managed to make any haylage. I got the weather wrong and had to bale the grass up on a hurry.
The slurry gate pictured earlier looks good.

im thinking this idea here with the slurry/scrape gate if you understand my child like drawings! also ive just noticed your in Shropshire! not too far away from me! im in the Newtown area, last year we were in Nesscliffe though, have moved since

 

[Hilly]

just put slatts on as a top

 

[jackyoung123123]

just put slatts on as a top

Hilly what do you think of the hole straight into the tank and the slurry gate as pictured above? do you think it will make life eaiser as some cattles manure can be solid so will not flow eaisly down the slats even once scraped once or twice?

 

[Hilly]

Hilly what do you think of the hole straight into the tank and the slurry gate as pictured above? do you think it will make life eaiser as some cattles manure can be solid so will not flow eaisly down the slats even once scraped once or twice?

Id put slatts on top if it were mine.

 

[beefandsleep]

10” kerb between scrape passage and bed. Scraped out 3 times a week, it is stackable so no slurry to deal with. Those water troughs are the best thing about the yard, I’ve just put them in an I love them. Tip them out every time I scrape.
It was previously an open yard with no kerb and a massive water trough at one end. I will be making all my yards like this over the next year.

 

[jackyoung123123]

View attachment 606620
10” kerb between scrape passage and bed. Scraped out 3 times a week, it is stackable so no slurry to deal with. Those water troughs are the best thing about the yard, I’ve just put them in an I love them. Tip them out every time I scrape.
It was previously an open yard with no kerb and a massive water trough at one end. I will be making all my yards like this over the next year.

one of the best ive seen, when you say stackable? how stackable is it very solid manure, what are you feeding them

 

[beefandsleep]

They are on a finishing ration, taking about 10kgs of barley couple of kgs protein 3kg haylage atm. I can stack it in the yard to about 6ft quite easily. I tip it in the field. I admit wet silage and it would probably be quite different.

 

[jackyoung123123]

They are on a finishing ration, taking about 10kgs of barley couple of kgs protein 3kg haylage atm. I can stack it in the yard to about 6ft quite easily. I tip it in the field. I admit wet silage and it would probably be quite different.

sorry to be a pain, what is the width of the straw littered part and the scrape passage way?

 

[beefandsleep]

What I do like about it compared to the old layout is that the cattle seem a lot more settled. They can lie undisturbed whereas before there was nothing to stop a dominant animal walking from the feed area straight onto the bed and pushing a more timid animal away. Two small tip over troughs mean there is never a queue or one animal stopping others from drinking like before. When I had large concrete troughs over a whole bay was taken up with a shitty trodden up area, and if they knocked the top off and broke a valve! What a fugin mess!

 

[beefandsleep]

sorry to be a pain, what is the width of the straw littered part and the scrape passage way?

Off the top of my head 12 ft scrape passage 20ft bedded. Might be 22 thinking about it.