Agweek goes deep with robotic milking

We've seen a number of stories on the emergence of free-cow-traffic robotic milking in the U.S. All bring something a bit different to the fold, because each story covers a new farm using the technology, and each farm is unique.

While there are many commonalities among dairy farms using our robotic technology--improved cow calmness, greater labor efficiencies, production volume increases, more time for farmers to spend on strategic matters or more family time (or both!) -- each dairyman has his own unique experience to share.

A story this week in Agweek by Mikkel Pates goes into great detail describing Ardy Johansen's farm in Underwood, MN. Pates' piece captures a lot of thinking from Ardy on labor issues, how he compares employee work routines, turnover, training and his own management style with other decision factors he put on the table before opting to adopt robotics. The story also highlights some of the family dynamics involved, from a father's advice to pondering whether robotic milking might someday influence whether his young sons want to run a dairy.

All in all, a compelling article.

From the ashes rises a state-of-the-art dairy

A Vermont dairy farm family has gone through some unbelievable hardship in the past couple of years. They lost their farm to a fire and found themselves having to rebuild their life. Not content just to try to return to the kind of farm they had in the past, they decided to not just rebuild, but create an advanced, Lely-equipped dairy farm that will serve them for many years in the future.

A local television report captures the story in a way we can't on this blog. But we're happy to post the video of the story here. Inspiring and, at the same time, exciting.

Dairy advisory teams forming in NY. An impressive display of unity and innovation.

The great thing about agriculture: when it's tough sledding, people join together and work to help out wherever or whomever they can.

This has been demonstrated many times over in decades past. Willie Nelson's Farm Aid concerts during the farm crisis of the early 80s; Midwest farmers shipping their hay free of charge down to farms in the Southeast during drought years so that cattle could be fed. The magazine Successful Farming held a national confab on crop diversification during the farm crisis, and bused in any farmer who wanted to attend from points across the country.

So it's probably no surprise to read this week about a volunteer effort in New York state to help dairy farmers manage through the current economic downturn. The publication Farm and Dairy details the effort, in which teams of dairy experts, from finance specialists to nutritionists to herd management advisors to robotics and technology pros are assembling to give farmers a 360-degree analysis of their dairy farm. They hope to form 22 teams this year.

Big kudos to all who are working to mount this effort and help dairy farmers weather the storm.

An academic paper you can actually read!

The dairy business is a global industry, a staple within agriculture and food comprised of interlocking biological, ecological, social and commercial systems. Therefore it has always commanded a fairly vast body of research to advance the science and business of dairying to new levels of efficiency, quality and social responsibility.

With great amounts of research come great numbers of scientific papers and peer-reviewed, controlled trials. That's what good science is all about. Yet it's refreshing to be able to read a piece of academic writing that doesn't focus on technical minutiae, control variables and hairsplitting methodology. Instead, the paper talks clearly about experiences and outcomes of robotic dairying, relying on interviews, observations and performance results from farmers using robotics as the driver of the content and analysis.

The paper, by University of Minnesota Extension Dairy Educator Jim Salfer, is a great summary of on-the-farm experiences and takes an unbiased view in describing current issues and achievements in robotic milking systems. An excerpt from the conclusion provides a good taste of this paper:

"AMS (automatic milking systems) clearly have demonstrated they have the ability to harvest high quality milk successfully. It has the opportunity, especially for smaller herds, to reduce labor, milk more frequently and provide flexibility of hours of labor. Surveys of producers show AMS users tend to be satisfied to very satisfied with their decision and flexibility of their time (de Jong et. al, 2003).

Anyone who wants a copy of this paper should email craig@akcmarketing (Lely USA's marketing agency) and he'll be glad to send one to you. Or call him at 515-331-1700.

Blog Watch : Orange Patch Dairy

This blog is written by a woman who journals about "the daily grind of a southern Minnesota Dairy Farm. My husband Jonathan and I run a 100 cow dairy in partnership with his father, and his additional 80 cows. We have a commercial dairy. We love our job, it may be hard but it's very rewarding."

They earlier this season they went to the Central Plains Dairy expo and saw the Lely Discovery barn cleaner and the Lely Juno feed pusher in action. Their account of the trip is here.

"...the innovation was intriguing," she writes. "One was a robot for pushing up TMR to cows and the other was a robot built to push manure into pits. Both were so intriguing!"

A great robotic story publsihed today in Iowa

Today's Des Moines Register ran a front-page feature today on the Lely robotic milking system that is operating on a dairy farm in Buffalo Center, Iowa. The farm is owned by Auggie Baumann and his son, Mike. They milk approximately 240 cows using 4 Lely Astronaut A3 robots. It's been a noticeable lifestyle change for the Baumanns since they installed the robots. They regularly talk about the new-found freedom they have in their lives, not being tied to the barn every waking hour of the day to push cows through a milker. The free-cow traffic that Lely robots work from allows cows to freely visit the robot when they want to.

The paper posted a short video as well. View it below.