Minimum in Feeding Station.

Now, instead of the total liters of milk being fixed, the number of cows you can have are fixed.

For this reason, the importance of getting the most milk per cow becomes relevant.

More milk means more feed from e.g. concentrate.

However, the VMS cannot give all feed, thus it also becomes important to look at the feed trough and the feeding station .  Make sure you have the amounts and settings set right for optimal using.

Not too much, especially not per visit. The VMS must remain crucial.

If a cow goes to the VMS less than 2.5 times a day, then you have to ask yourself: “Does she deserve to get concentrate in the feeding station?”

Spraying on the teat – June 2017

It seems logical, but the disinfectant spray that you apply on the teats after every milking session must applied correctly. Now that the fans are blowing at full speed and the windbreakers are completely open, it’s not uncommon that the spray is blown away before it even hits the teat.

If the spray doesn’t find itself on the teats, look at why that might be the case. If it’s the fans’ fault then remove or reposition them.
However, that might result in quite an uncomfortable situation because the flies would be a terrible nuisance underneath the cows.

It sometimes also happens that the spray nozzle, a little or completely, is blocked.
And the spray track can not be adjusted properly either, the technician can adjust this.

In the case that this issue happens just by some cows, I’d suggest chancing the spray settings for these particular cows to “Normal” or even “Economic”.

Robots and Grazing.

For a successfully grazing policy on farms with milking robots, you have to keep a few rules in mind:

• They start learning to graze when they are young!
• The keyword for grazing is “Early” :  Early in year, early in the morning and early (young) learning is very important for succes
• Keep in mind what is achievable, a lot of grass in the cow and feeding little in the stall, or is grass just a dessert, a meadow as a runway, play meadow and then feed a lot in the stalls.
  This really has to do with the amount of hectares grass and parcels round the farmhouse you have in relation to cows.
  If you overestimate this relationship, the smallest change in weather or the length of season will mess with your plans.
• Cows constantly need to be triggered to move: if they are in the stalls, they should also want to go to the meadow and if they are in the meadow they should want to go the robot.
  This can be achieved when you give the cows fresh grass every day and wait to add new feed in the stalls when they are outside.
• An ideal situation is one where they would go straight to the robots when they come in the stall and go to the troughs after they come out of the robot.
• A meadow selection port, Smartgate,  could make it easier.
• The path to the pasture should be wide (2-way path) to accommodate easy transportation of cows. It should be at least so wide that the dominant cows don’t have the chance to stop other cows from moving.
• Drinking water during warm weather is also crucial. It would be ideal to place the water alongside the path to the stall.

“Stichting Weidegang” (Foundation Grazing), from University Wageningen Holland, has elaborated on 5 possibilities, with the correct policy added to it.

It is assumed that the average cow eats about 15KG of dry feed per day.

Possibility 1 is the maximum grazing grass, which means 13 KG Dry Matter of grass and 2 kg of roughage in the stable.

Possibility 5 is the minimum grazing grass which means 2KG DM grass and 13KG roughage added in the stall.

The possibilities 2,3 and 4 includes policies gradually feeding less grass and adding more feed in the stall.

From nature behavior the cow prefers to eat most when she finds herself in the meadow in the morning and at dusk. And then, safely hidden, ruminating under a tree.

Finding ways to play with these times by giving more fresh grass or picking the cows up at certain times makes grazing more fun.
The tree has now been replaced by the roof of the barn.

If the weather is hot than you can use these times by having the cows graze in the mornings and evenings instead of during the day.

Settings around cleaning after separation milk.

When milk can’t go into the milk tank, you have four options: the milk goes into one of the three cans or directly into the drainage.

It is possible to select different types of cleaning for different situations.
DeLaval thinks it is safest to select the main cleaning after a milking containing antibiotics.

There are two possibilities when it comes to separation milk: Separation 1 and 2.The milk programmed as Separation 1 is directed to Can 1 and Separation 2 to Can 2.

There are also two possibilities for colostrum: Colostrum 1 and  Colostrum 2 go to Can 3 but you can select a different cleaning program.

It can be useful to select Separation 1 or Colostrum 1 for light cases, with no penicillin but you also don’t want the milk in the tank. (Colostrum from first calving cows, a cow that has been dry for full period, calf drinking milk, etc.)

So, “1” with a simple cleaning. And separation “2” and colostrum “2” for heavier cases (after antibiotic treatment, been dry for a too short period of time) which need a heaver cleaning.

In principle the “1”s can endure a milder cleaning than a main cleaning. The “2” would need a main cleaning.

Drainage milk will always be of bad quality or infectious for other cows and should always be programmed with the main cleaning.

“1” for easy and “2” for hard is easy to remember and also easy to explain to employees and substitutes within your dairy.

In practice, many dairy farmers select a lighter cleaning after a penicillin case because the main cleaning takes them up too much time.

I hope you understand that DeLaval perceives this to be very risky!
Using your touchscreen, you can milk cows with deviating milk consecutively. After this, VMS cleans with the biggest cleaning programmed, or you can turn on the main cleaning. This is safest and also costs the least amount of time.

Feeding cows  from 100 days before setting them dry

De biggest feeding mistakes are made in the transition period or at the end of lactation.

Truthfully, the last 100 days before drying of, to ensure the cow obtains the correct feed, it is more important to correlate her ration to stamina and activity levels than to how much she is producing. A farmer has a better view of this than a computer..
Also the first experiences with the new Body Condition Score (BCS) camera show that it pays off to adjust certain measures and so correcting the feed amount in this period.

Gather information from cows who are ca. 100 days before setting dry, or 130-230 days after the last insemination (if you did not do or register pregnancy tests), about the cow’s stamina, production, feed ration and VMS visits.
Does she need more condition (energy feed) or has she already too much? More protein or less? More…..?, or less…..?

It can be useful to make yourself a list that shows the production, feed ration and within how many days she’s to be set dry  in one list.

I get my copy from the list “Feeds Consumption” (Right mouse click) and paste it to “My Lists”. Then, with “Show/Hide Designer” you can choose in the category “Cow Calendar” the column “Days until Dry” and you can add “Number of Milkings” from the category “Milking”, by dragging it (Left mouse hold and drag) to your list.

The newest versions of DelPro even makes it possible to color these cows, e.g. less than 100 days before drying off, so that they stand out!

If these cows are visible, you’ll increase their longevity!