milking 3x

[curriej]

Hi guys,

Been thinking about doing 3x milking for a while milking 600 cows and was wondering if anyone had any thoughts on the best system for staff? also if we are better with night milkers or full time staff?

let me know your thoughts thanks.

 

[jondear]

Poor staff and cows .

 

[Holsteinfriesian90]

Why do you want to milk 3 times a day?

 

[dinderleat]

What’s the current her average? Staff wise you need lots of them, possibly a completely different team for the night milking

 

[curriej]

averaging 32 litres per day per cow look to boost that to 35 on 3x

 

[thorpe]

ignorant question from me how much a litre does it cost to milk a cow? is it like me chasing that extra bit of wheat yield , it costs me more to get it?

 

[curriej]

Poor staff and cows .

Poor staff and cows .

can you back up your statement ?

 

[curriej]

Why do you want to milk 3 times a day?

To get the most out of the cows as we are breeding them for milk. However there is an argument there in terms of the costs it takes to get you to the extra litres and its perhaps debatable whether there is enough in it to make it worth your time what does everyone think ?

 

[pappuller]

averaging 32 litres per day per cow look to boost that to 35 on 3x

So not even a 10% increase in output ?

 

[pappuller]

averaging 32 litres per day per cow look to boost that to 35 on 3x

Your bonkers

 

[Serup]

It depends a lot on your setup if it will be worthwhile or not. We started 10 month ago and i am happy with it.
We milk about 360 cows in a 40:40 side-by-side. We are two milkers for the first two milkings, and only one on evenings. We have a small group of 20 cows with all cows that are any bother. They get milked first in the morning and last in the afternoon. In the evening it is only 340 easy cows.
the first two milkings are about 15 min faster each, so saved 1 man hour. Evening milking is about 4 hours from lights on to lights off. So it cost me 3 hours per day. We went up from 34-35 to 37-38 on danish reds. It takes time to get yield up, as it’s mostly fresh cows that increase. I expect a 15% increase after 12 month. We are at 12.300 kilo ecm average last 12 month.
For me it cost about 1/3 of the extra income including everything.

 

[thorpe]

Your bonkers

this is what i was getting at how much a litre does it cost to milk a cow?

 

[Farmer Keith]

Have you looked at all other options for getting the extra 3 litres on twice a day? There’s probably some light bulbs or a wizards potion or something?

Supermarket aligned liquid contract?

 

[Cowabunga]

I did it for seven years. I would not do it again on the scale and skeleton staff I had doing it. Waste of my youth.

 

[Horn&corn]

We considered it for this winter but with Covid it didn’t seem a good time to bring in a new crew for night milking. Maybe next winter. Can’t find anyone that will tell me how much extra the cows would eat. Other costs and hassle can be worked out.
I expect it would work well for autumn block herd till turn out

 

[More to life]

We considered it for this winter but with Covid it didn’t seem a good time to bring in a new crew for night milking. Maybe next winter. Can’t find anyone that will tell me how much extra the cows would eat. Other costs and hassle can be worked out.
I expect it would work well for autumn block herd till turn out

It might make an autumn block into ayr fairly quickly

 

[pappuller]

We considered it for this winter but with Covid it didn’t seem a good time to bring in a new crew for night milking. Maybe next winter. Can’t find anyone that will tell me how much extra the cows would eat. Other costs and hassle can be worked out.
I expect it would work well for autumn block herd till turn out

You will have to feed extra to get extra, we went from 9000l yield to 11000 switching from 2x parlour milking to robots, a cow will not eat much more than 14kgdm of conserved forage so that extra yield has to come from a concentrated form. I personally don't think the op will gain a great deal with a 10% yield increase other than more cost and headaches.

 

[betweenthelines]

Going from 2x day to 1x day sees volumes go down but solids go up. So does the reverse happen when going up to 3x day? Might get an increase in volume but no significant improvement in total solids?

Could you not try milking at 12 hour intervals with separate teams for the AM and PM shifts?

 

[Manney]

I make a reasonable profit on 1x milking a day so you chaps on 3x milking must be making a fortune.

..... runs and hides

 

[Tim G]

averaging 32 litres per day per cow look to boost that to 35 on 3x

An extra 80 - 90p per cow per day.
Then labour, power, another wash down, chemicals etc.
Is it really worth it?