Passage widths

[farmboy]

How many feet do people allow for feed passages for the cows but also the centre drive through for the wagon? What's the ideal and what's the least you could get away with?

 

[Beef farmer]

A shed for 120 days or 365?

 

[farmboy]

Moving from Ayr to late summer/autumn over next couple years. Would hope to have cows out here at least by day from beginning march till end October

 

[Agri Design]

how long is a bit of string.. More info required
What is the shed for?
cubicles backing on to passage?
how are you mucking out?
type size of stock?
any other or future uses?

even with this sort of info opinions will vary, central feed pass lots of people feel it's pointless, it definitely has it place and i generally prefer it.

David

 

[rusty]

Our shed is 10ft passage between cubicles and 16ft between 3rd row and feed fence. Centre passage 20ft wide which is much better than older shed that's only 15ft. Shed was built for all year housing although we now block autumn calve and graze for over 6 months.

 

[farmboy]

how long is a bit of string.. More info required
What is the shed for?
cubicles backing on to passage?
how are you mucking out?
type size of stock?
any other or future uses?

even with this sort of info opinions will vary, central feed pass lots of people feel it's pointless, it definitely has it place and i generally prefer it.

David

It'll be a shed on the side of our cubicles for feeding cows in. Feeding on outside isn't an option so will have to be drive through passages, probably 2 side by side as news feed space for 400. Won't be backing on to cubicles if I can help it as I personally don't like it but each to their own.

 

[Beef farmer]

10ft would be enough. We used 2 old shed this winter that only had 7ft scrapways, cows didn't Mind. But they aren't the biggest of cows.

 

[farmboy]

10ft would be enough. We used 2 old shed this winter that only had 7ft scrapways, cows didn't Mind. But they aren't the biggest of cows.

Yeah I was thinking 12ft and 20ft if feeding on both sides if you see what I mean. My cows are average Holstein friesians and going forward crossing to fleck, monty, Norwegian red so probably stay the same size. Some of my older cubicles are 9ft passages and a bit narrow got one newer row that's about 12ft and a lot better

 

[Beef farmer]

I'm going 11 in the new shed, but if I could go 9 and get an extra run of beds in I would without a doubt.

 

[Headless chicken]

Ours were meant to be 10 but ended up at 9 between 2 beds. See no issue with it because as someone put it to me it's only an alley way. Much more important to have big open spaces to allow cows to coming bulling.

15ft cow standing to eat from a 16ft center feed

 

[Fergieman]

16' centre feed passage 12' passage on slats.

 

[farmboy]

You gotta put in what fits in the shed I just find in my 9ft passages there's a fair depth of shite the next milking compared to my 12ft passage. They can also feel very crowded with cows coming and going

 

[Jamer]

11' between cubicles, 14' cow feed passage, 18' centre feed passage on last 135' long shed.- wouldn't be inclined to narrow it anywhere.

7'6", 9' and 15' on old shed, all far too narrow particularly when building is 170' long

 

[Durry cows]

15' passages here if we put a next shed up, think its worth every penny go and have a look round grosvenor farms how they have done theirs or search the vid on youtube? Worth more than slats or automatic scrapers IMO

 

[Tarw Coch]

As wide as possible, our old cubicle shed which is rarely more the 50% stocked now is 10 ft feed and 8ft between cubicles, about standard for its time but when you look at more modern sheds looks very inadequate.
Our newer shed is 14ft feed and 10ft between cubicles. It seemed generous at the time but if re doing it today I'd go wider, especially between the cubicles where most of the muck build up is.

 

[early riser]

Looked at a shed last year that was 18ft against barrier and 14ft between beds, cows looked fantastic, so so clean.

Yes it is considerably more initial building cost, but what price do you put on years and years of DD if cows are slopping about in their own excrement in a tiny narrow passage?

Note, this was a very densely stocked shed, for a more normal stocking rate I might be a bit concerned about the passages getting too dry in spring/summer and getting slippy.

 

[Ducati899]

12 ft passage for cows to stand and feed here and 16ft for wagon

 

[Tarw Coch]

Looked at a shed last year that was 18ft against barrier and 14ft between beds, cows looked fantastic, so so clean.

Yes it is considerably more initial building cost, but what price do you put on years and years of DD if cows are slopping about in their own excrement in a tiny narrow passage?

Note, this was a very densely stocked shed, for a more normal stocking rate I might be a bit concerned about the passages getting too dry in spring/summer and getting slippy.

What do you mean by a densely stocked shed? Only 3 types I'm aware of,
Cubicles only with feeding outside,
2 rows of cubicles with 2 passages, one between the cubicles and one feed passage
Or 3 rows of cubicles, one passage between 2 rows of cubicles plus another row of cubicles backing out onto the feed passage.

 

[Moorlands]

What do you mean by a densely stocked shed? Only 3 types I'm aware of,
Cubicles only with feeding outside,
2 rows of cubicles with 2 passages, one between the cubicles and one feed passage
Or 3 rows of cubicles, one passage between 2 rows of cubicles plus another row of cubicles backing out onto the feed passage.

Think he means it was stocked at over 100% saw a shed with big wide passages on a farm 12months ago and was stocked at nearly 200%!! Didn't seem crowded either and cows looked pucka but each to there own though don't know what farm assurance would have to say!

 

[early riser]

What do you mean by a densely stocked shed? Only 3 types I'm aware of,
Cubicles only with feeding outside,
2 rows of cubicles with 2 passages, one between the cubicles and one feed passage
Or 3 rows of cubicles, one passage between 2 rows of cubicles plus another row of cubicles backing out onto the feed passage.

This was a two row shed but stocked at more like 180%

It worked though because the herd was 3x milked so there was always a group moving round, plus they never ran short of feed at the barrier, feed pushed up six times a day