Herringbone with in shed feeder & poor throughput

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Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
NZ
Morning
I'm not sure what kind of milking sheds/parlours you lot have over there, I assume something a bit more sophisticated than old herringbones & a single set of cups.

Anyway, this is the setup I'm currently working with - 22 cup herringbone with an in shed feed system (continuous bin, not individual bins per "bail", automatic cup removers and automatic teat sprayer. One person can put about 130 cows through per hour at this time of the year (mid summer).

Here's the issue: cups come off, the gate opens, a couple of cows walk out, the third or fourth one can't leave crumbs behind in the feed bin and ths cow holds up the whole row. Cows behind get grumpy, start shittting everywhere, the milker has to leave cupping the cows on the opposite row and move the cows out one by one. Similarly, once you've got the row cleared out, you've got to move every cow into position coming in because they stop and nibble on leftovers from the previous row. It doesn't seem to matter what product or what amount is being fed, there's always something left somewhere. The only way to stop this happening is to completely stop feeding, (which allows me to push over 200 cows through per hour).

I've talked with local parlour builders and feed system installers - no one is really interested in provding a solution, they're too busy making money fitting new systems to care about a small job like this.

My options so far are:
1 - Hinged bins that will fold up out of the way when the gate opens, using vacuum actuators (complicated)
2 - Hinged covers that fold down to cover the bin when the gate opens, using vacuum actuators (complicated)
3 - Flood wash system that clears the bin when the gate opens (easy to make and install but will result in some feed loss)
4 - High voltage chain or wire above the meal bin which energizes when the gate opens (it seems like a bad idea - would probably be a bit of fun though).

Thoughts? I'm leaning towards option 3 at the moment unless there are better options out there.
 

Rossymons

Member
Location
Cornwall
Calibrate your feeders and check how much they're actually feeding out. Sounds like they don't have enough time to clear it which leads me think they have too much in the first place.
 
How much are they eat? If your getting 200 an hour through they are only in the parlour for 6mins and 40seconds. Some of that time is filling the parlour and emptying so you probably only have 4 minutes of time for them to eat it. Play with how much you feed them to be able to lick the trough clean in 4 minutes or less
 

Farmer Keith

Member
Location
North Cumbria
Surely the man cupping up leaving that job to go and chase cows out is counter productive and possibly he’s the one making them sh!t everywhere. Maybe it’s as simple as just putting a second man in there when it’s an issue, although I’d check the calibration as said above, there are points in lactation where they just get lazy and won’t leave the parlour!
 

onesiedale

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Derbyshire
Are the cows going straight back out on to same paddock, fresh grazing or are they being held in a holding area?
Always works best if they know they've go fresh grass every milking
 

Jdunn55

Member
Why are you feeding any at all?

Is it cost effective?
Yes. Assuming a milk price of £0.28/litre and a cake price of £350/t you would have a 'profit' of £0.21/kg of cake fed, up to 8kg/cow/day fed anything more and this would decrease.

Maths:
Cake £350/t = £0.35/kg
1kg of cake = 2 litres
28ppl x 2 = £0.56
£0.56-£0.35=£0.21

How much you feed is up to you as the efficiency will start dropping off after 8kg of cake (ie: 9kg is unlikely to generate 18 litres) and obviously feeding too high a level can have negatives elsewhere but generally it is worthwhile feeding atleast some cake.
 

onesiedale

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Derbyshire
Yes. Assuming a milk price of £0.28/litre and a cake price of £350/t you would have a 'profit' of £0.21/kg of cake fed, up to 8kg/cow/day fed anything more and this would decrease.

Maths:
Cake £350/t = £0.35/kg
1kg of cake = 2 litres
28ppl x 2 = £0.56
£0.56-£0.35=£0.21

How much you feed is up to you as the efficiency will start dropping off after 8kg of cake (ie: 9kg is unlikely to generate 18 litres) and obviously feeding too high a level can have negatives elsewhere but generally it is worthwhile feeding atleast some cake.
It could be argued that feed efficiency drops off after the first kg 😉. But that's a whole different discussion!
 

Devon lad

Member
Location
Mid Devon
Morning
I'm not sure what kind of milking sheds/parlours you lot have over there, I assume something a bit more sophisticated than old herringbones & a single set of cups.

Anyway, this is the setup I'm currently working with - 22 cup herringbone with an in shed feed system (continuous bin, not individual bins per "bail", automatic cup removers and automatic teat sprayer. One person can put about 130 cows through per hour at this time of the year (mid summer).

Here's the issue: cups come off, the gate opens, a couple of cows walk out, the third or fourth one can't leave crumbs behind in the feed bin and ths cow holds up the whole row. Cows behind get grumpy, start shittting everywhere, the milker has to leave cupping the cows on the opposite row and move the cows out one by one. Similarly, once you've got the row cleared out, you've got to move every cow into position coming in because they stop and nibble on leftovers from the previous row. It doesn't seem to matter what product or what amount is being fed, there's always something left somewhere. The only way to stop this happening is to completely stop feeding, (which allows me to push over 200 cows through per hour).

I've talked with local parlour builders and feed system installers - no one is really interested in provding a solution, they're too busy making money fitting new systems to care about a small job like this.

My options so far are:
1 - Hinged bins that will fold up out of the way when the gate opens, using vacuum actuators (complicated)
2 - Hinged covers that fold down to cover the bin when the gate opens, using vacuum actuators (complicated)
3 - Flood wash system that clears the bin when the gate opens (easy to make and install but will result in some feed loss)
4 - High voltage chain or wire above the meal bin which energizes when the gate opens (it seems like a bad idea - would probably be a bit of fun though).

Thoughts? I'm leaning towards option 3 at the moment unless there are better options out there.
1 way or another the cows are either being fed too much in the parlour or too much in the paddock. We get this in the winter at the end of lactation when our spring calvers are late lactation and housed 24/7 on silage. We kick them off silage at mid day and 10pm to aid parlour flow.
 
You could, I wouldnt reccomend it though. It's an average. 8kg of cake up until the last 3 months isnt an issue, some of the big holstein guys could be feeding 4t a lactation that's 13kg/day
Good job wheat and soya are cheap.

#sustainability

Did lic say that for every £1 spent on feed it costs another .50p in costs to feed that.
 

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