Friday, March 29, 2024

A SMASHing time with robots

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Small dairy herd farmers may not be as interested in expanding or passing on their farms to their children, but an interest in technology lured 65 of them to see the robotic milker in action at Feilding High school’s upgraded Ngakaunui dairy farm.
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The small unit milking 50 cows through a De Laval robotic milker was of great interest to the group at a field day organised by SMASH (Smaller Milk and Supply Herds).

Recent research by Lincoln University found expansion was not a priority for many small-scale dairy farmers, but many were looking at options and while it may not be feasible to upgrade at the payout now, the nature of small farmers’ herd size makes them interested in robotic plants, organiser Joyce Brown said.

One milking unit was ideal for 60 cows, Melinda Little, channel manager from De Laval, sadi. There were economies of scale if the yard and gate set-up cost was spread across many robotic units. The costs were not as high as many people thought , she said.

Grant Davis, agriculture teacher at Feilding High, said for the school it was a great chance to showcase an exciting technology to the students, many hundred of whom were involved in the agricultural, agricultural science and agricultural business programmes.

“It’s easy to teach kids to cup cows, and that still happens on the farm and other local farms, but the real strength of the robotic system is that it gets the students thinking about pasture management, culling of cows, analysing data and looking at the whole system.”

“The students are also really engaged with how the robot works and is programmed and they get to consider careers in the wider industry.

“On this farm, the robot is not replacing the labour, but its shifts the emphasis of the labour to concentrate on the data, how each cow is producing, the pasture management, growing more grass, checking pre-grazing and post-grazing residuals and setting up the fences right so the cows are encouraged to traffic correctly travelling to the robot to be milked and then onto fresh grass.

“On a smaller farm, the robot milking allows you time to do much more productive things than cupping cows – you can concentrate on growing more grass and making more milk.”

More: Techno savvy helps train cows

 

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