Robot propels milking into ultra-efficient age
Robot propels milking into ultra-efficient age
By Andy Collings
CONTENTED cows make more milk, insists Kate Hudson. And she believes the Lely Astronaut robotic milking system has helped to achieve this.
Mrs Hudson milks 58 Holsteins on her 80ha (200 acre) unit at Shere, Surrey. The herd is split into two groups according to yield with the higher yielding group averaging 12,000 litres.
"There are three basic ingredients to achieving maximum performance from cows," she says. "Correct breeding, correct diet and a correct environment."
Intelligent animals
This latter requirement, Mrs Hudson believes, is often neglected by dairy farmers. "Cows are intelligent animals and youve got to respect them for this. If they are unhappy through poor treatment, inadequate bedding or suffering from stress, they will just not produce to their maximum potential."
The decision to invest £88,000 in the Lely Astronaut robotic milker was induced initially through Mrs Hudsons failure to recruit a suitable herdsman to milk the cows.
"I think we have to face the facts that attracting an intelligent, caring and knowledgeable person to milk cows in this day and age is asking a lot," she says. "There are far better professions for them to be involved in and ones which clearly pay better.
"A machine doesnt need holidays, doesnt have tantrums and, if its a good one, doesnt go sick."
While a herdsman is still employed to look after the cows, followers and youngstock, the Astronaut has been in operation since December last year. It stands in the corner of the barn linked to the bulk tank used by the now redundant herringbone parlour.
"It took just two days for the cows to adopt the system," she says. "And there are only about six which we have to help through the system due to their teat arrangement which the robotic cup placement system cannot work effectively."
Teat placing
Mrs Hudson concedes that good teat placing will be an important breed factor for the future to produce the robotic compatible cow.
"The cows are clearly more content with the ability to choose when they are to be milked. The high yielders average about four-and-a-half visits/day and the lower yielders about three-and-a-half visits.
"What is amazing is that the freshly calved cows seem to look on the robot as if it was its calf, visiting the unit as often as a calf would perhaps feed. This emphasises the point that twice-a-day milking is not a natural phenomena for cows."
One of the most useful features of the system is its ability to record the conductivity of the milk produced from individual quarters. Mrs Hudson believes that a check on the changes in this department can provide an early warning to impending physical and mental problems.
Environmental mastitis
And in respect of health matters, Mrs Hudson reports there have been no cases of environmental mastitis, despite the cows being housed closely together in a bedded yard.
"I believe the ability of the robot system to milk each quarter as a separate entity has a strong bearing on udder health," she says. "The fact the unit recognises that different quarters take different times to milk out raises questions about the practice of removing the whole cluster in conventional parlours. There must be an element of over or under-milking."
To date, Mrs Hudson reports she is pleased with the performance of the Astronaut. However, there are questions on how the system will perform when the cows are turned out to grass.
"Im not sure how this will work. We have several fields some distance from the milking unit which may make it difficult for the cows to make the required trips.
"It may be that we use the closest fields almost as exercise areas and buffer feed from material gathered from other fields. We shall see." *
Above: Lelys Astronaut robotic milker receives a visitor from Kate Hudsons herd of Holsteins.
Left: Creating an environment in which cows can be content is essential if maximum milk yields are to be achieved, says Kate Hudson.