Farm, family, and friends

My Uncle Al, (my dad's brother), and his wife Delia started a dairy farm in New Mexico about 30 years ago.  My cousin Cass, his wife Dorie, and their daughter Mia farm with them.

They came to visit!  We showed them around our farm and then visited some local farms, including Glen and Jill Feldpausch's farm - Rich-Ro.  (The name of their farm comes from combining the first names of the founders, which apparently was popular.  My grandparents named their farm CarDale for Caroline and Dale.  We STILL get mail for CarDale Farms.)

My dad Jack, my Uncle Al, and my cousin Cass.  Wow, I look short.

It's fun giving tours to other dairy farmers, because their questions and interests are so different.  I also like to take pictures of times when the brothers and son all put their hands on their hips simultaneously.

Due to Kris' hand position, you can tell he's not blood related. : ) 

It also gave my dad and Al the opportunity to retell one of their favorite stories - when my dad jumped from one silo to another.  He and Al had judged the distance from the ground, and my dad was sure he could make it.  He did!  And lives to tell the tale.  I haven't told my kids this one ... I don't want them to try it themselves.  (Though really, that is pretty sweet.)

Some tour activity - here's how we push up feed for the cows:

It's a pretty low tech tool - it's a board at an angle.  It works perfectly to drive through quickly and push the feed closer to the cattle.  When they eat, they push it away from them, so this ensures they can easily reach all of it.  We do this at least every two hours during the day.

Three times a week, we scrape out all the sawdust that's currently in the barn.  We then put down lime, which kills bacteria.  After that, we put down new sawdust.  Under the sawdust we have a pad, a mattress, and another mattress pad - but the fresh sawdust provides extra cushion, plus helps keep the cattle dry.

I just asked Kris, "What do you really call the sawdust shooter?"  He said, "Sawdust shooter.  That's what it's named."  Somehow I thought there was a more technical term ... but here it is, shooting the sawdust out!

Then we went to Rich-Ro and talked with Brett, Glen, and Brianne Feldpaush.

Brett

Glen and the lovely Brianne

On their farm, they milk with timers - you can see the 120 in the picture.  When a milker begins prepping a cow, he starts the timer.  It counts up, and when it hits 90, he can return to the first cow and attach the milker.  He also gets back to the first cow before the timer hits 120 seconds.  The timer is there to make the milking process more consistent for the cows, with the ultimate goal of comfort and increased milk production.

They also toured a rotary parlor, which is like a slow merry go round - the cow gets on, gets milked, and walks off.  And of course saw the robot milker, where no human attaches the milker, because the robot does the milking for you.

There are so many ways to milk and increase cow comfort and production.  We're all working on it - all over the country and all over our gene pool.

If you want to know more, you can like my farm page on Facebook, follow @carlashelley on twitter, or get the posts sent to your email by filling out the form on the right. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me!

Robots at Swisslane Farms

Today with his free time, Kris went to help out at ... another farm!

Our friends, Annie and Jerry Link, just installed eight robot milkers to milk 500 cows.  Today was the first day they started milking them in it.  Their friends, relatives, other farmers with robots, Lely people, people from MSU's robotic dairy (and I'm sure others) all helped. 

Kris was running a robot for part of it and said that a few cows were hesitant, but mostly when they saw the feed pellets they'd go right in.  The first time a cow enters a robot someone has to manually position the laser to see where the udder is.  After that first time, the robot has a record of it, and knows.  The lasers go every time, since udders change depending on how much milk they're giving, how recently they had a calf, etc. but it has a benchmark.

We're happy for our friends and their new adventure! 

&&&&

Back on our farm ... it's snowing.  Hard, wet snow.  Probably all the schools are going to be cancelled and the roads are bad.  That kind of snow.  Both beautiful and inconvenient.

Naturally, Kris said that the heifers decided that they didn't want to be in the pasture they were in, and they broke a fence and went to a different one.  They weren't out, just not where they were supposed to be, so he said he wasn't going to bother about it when it was pitch black and snowing.

Meanwhile, our kids went outside and played in the snow, until after their bedtime.  Their clothes won't even have a chance to dry before morning.  Kris' will though ... we have the state annual Farm Bureau meeting tomorrow.  It's snowed every single year I've gone to this.  It's the most reliable snowfall I've ever experienced.  It's okay.  Probably all these farmers driving to the meeting have four-wheel drive anyway. 

Robot milker

It’s 2011. Remember how far in the future that seemed when we were all young? Where are all our robots?

For us, they’re across the road. And rapidly spreading.

Our neighbors, Howard and Mary Jo Straub, own Triple H Farms. They have a robot milker.

I know what you’re thinking. It’s not an R2-D2-like creature walking around the
parlor, tending to each cow.

The brand name is Lely. It milks all by itself, all the time. It costs about $250,000.



First, the cow enters the machine. She’s wearing a responder on her neck that communicates how much feed she’s going to get. She eats grain while she’s being milked. (The Straubs pasture their cows, so they graze outdoors the rest of the time.)

She steps in and stands over a grate. Not only does this space their feet correctly, but it also keeps the area clear of manure.

The brushes come in. Like a tiny car wash, the brushes go over each teat and clean them.



Since every cow’s udder is a little different, the robot scans the udder to detect each teat’s location. (It looks like little red laser beams going over it.) Then it attaches the four teat cups.



Then milking begins! As each quarter is done, the teat cup comes off. Then the robot sprays off the udder. The gate opens, and the cow walks out. The next cow, eager to be milked, steps in.



View from the other side

All of it is run by a computer. If there’s a problem with the milking, a different gate opens and she’s shuttled into a holding pen. If her responder indicates she’s in heat, she’s moved into there to be bred. It’s really an amazing system with tons of detail, like a weighing floor, milk quality measuring system, and management software that even lets you compare your results with other Lely users worldwide. (You can learn more about it here.)



People come from all around to see it. They have a viewing window and a chockfull guest book. We take all our visitors there. The Straubs had the first robotic milker in Michigan, and now Lely is putting them in eight farms in Michigan this year.

Mary Jo told me that if something isn’t working, Lely performs a service call. The other day, she said, Lely was at another farm and couldn’t be there immediately. So, their herdsman Dan used a piece of wire from an old political sign and rigged up the machine so it was working again.


Dan, Straubs' herdsman and our neighbor

Robots, just like we thought the future would be like. Pair that with farm people who can fix anything … it’s better than R2-D2.