Tip of the month – July 2016

Opening Entrance Door.

More often than originally thought, the entry gate of the VMS is not situated correctly. The entry gate is completely adjustable, which gives DeLaval the opportunity to milk very large cows, from Fleckvieh, Buffalo’s (for Mozzarella) but also very small, thin cows like Jersey’s. However, cows at your farm will most likely not differ that significantly.

The entry gate can open up to 300 times a day. So, it tends to shift away from its original place.

If the entry gate is too narrow, it means that the sensor on the cylinder does not notice that the cow is far enough in because the gate is not closed enough. You often see this occur with fatter cows. Or maybe because of the feed manger is to far back, that they are pushed too far back in the VMS. It results in the robot not allowing to start milking the cow.

Or the door is set too spacious and then small or young cows can move from left to right too much.

If you have normal or small Holstein cows, then you should be able to stick a hand between the arrow and the entry gate. If you have Fleckvieh or MRIJ cows, then you should be able to stick a fist between the arrow and the entry gate.

Tip of the month – June 2016

Ruminating activity.

On average, 50-60% of the cows should be ruminating.

And at the times that you are observing if there are any cows in heat you can also check / count this behavior.

In the meantime, count the jaw movements of an individual cow between two regurgitations.

That should be between 60-70 movements.

Less is not good, then she needs to do less movements because the food has not as much structure as it should have, or she has eaten to little amount!

More is also not good because the extra times she chews implies she is making more saliva.
That in return could entail that the cow wants to neutralize the pH in the rumen which possibly indicates subclinical acidosis!

You will also notice that by changes in grass silage also could have an influence on the amount of jaw movements a cow needs to do.

Also warm weatherstress could influence this phenomenon, at first she ruminates more often when she has problems making enough sodium bicarbonate on her own, and then she ruminates to few because she needs to much time to breath. And eating less because of warm weather also means she ruminates less.
And an empty feedlot for a few hours.

Tip of the month – May 2016

Better milking empty an problem udder / quarter

It occasionally happens that after an mastitis infection or another cause, a teat never fully recovers. Thus, resulting in it not coming back to normal production.
Also, it could be more difficult milking empty this udder quarter .

The default settings will sometimes cause the teat to be taken off earlier because the flow of milk is, even briefly, too low.

Such a quarter will be removed too soon, and will dry up.

Of course, this is not the idea.

The options you have now are: select on the Animal card (Configuration) the “Base take-off decision on lower flow” and maybe too “Extended pre-milking time” (she gets more time to let the milk flow).
Also, you have (by Cleaning) the possibility for teat cleaning to “Clean twice”, because that stimulates also often the milk flow.

But the most important thing is that you discover on time that this can happen!

Tip of the month – April 2016

Check with light how clean the lens is

A flashlight is very common these days, even more common on smartphones. Aim the flashlight at the camera, daily, from the side (!) and see if the glass is clean. Not only where the camera is is important, but also the corners on top from where the main laser and teat laser have to do their job.

Tip of the month – March 2016

Efficious Milkings

Increasing the capacity of a VMS is always interesting.

In retrospect, each milking costs time. Thus, each milking costs money. So, a VMS visit must be efficient. In the Report MILKINFO => MILKING PERFORMANCE you see, among other things, which cows use the most time Milking Duration but also which cows give the least yield per milking (= average milk yield per milking from the past 7 days.)

Little milk per visit is not efficient!
Also, take a look at “Animal” => Group Milkings (be sure to set it for 24 hours) and then sort according to milking yield. It should be self-explanatory that we would rather not see any milkings under 5 liters. This, of course, is theoretical.
But, one dairy has more than the other. And many of these milkings are often from the same cows. Often, these milking jobs are incomplete and don’t let yourself be appalled at the minutes this milking has taken in the next column…
If these cows have just calved, or you have a good explanation then it’s fine. It will pass.
Otherwise, could you put them dry?
Is the milk permission for these cows set well?
Do they need to come less often or do they need more time between milkings after an incomplete milk job?
Are they, almost, three teated?