Converting to Dairy with Robotic Milking—O'Harte's Farm, Monaghan

[Music] [Music] so Sheen we've come to manahan today yeah nice bright morning for for the midd of De Sun cless so um no you you've a unique system here as supp yeah it's a farm belonging to the heart family yeah and Tommy basly yeah so maybe just give it description how long you're milking here and what you do yeah of course yeah so uh Tommy Eden here had sucklers maybe for six plus years and they said they need to make a switch or the farm wasn't going to survive you know paying off Farm staff and they said something needs to be done so Eden actually himself Tommy's son he actually done a dairy herd management course I think it was in Scotland or somewhere and always had the interest in robots and dairing so he said to himself right Dad why don't we go into the the dairy cows and Tommy and himself looked and they decided we're going to go all in on the Flack fiz and we're going to go with Lei and we're going to get our robots in so they made the decision then in I think it was 2020 or 2021 and they converted a fully indoor suckler unit to a fully indoor Dairy unit so they approached Nile and they looked about two l a5s a discovery and a cat feeder so they went for that and then as timing on then they went with the L Vector when they got the system up and and going so all they done BAS was converted a suckler shed dug a tank at the back put in cubicles and said we're going to we're going to start to milk house here so as you can see above us then they milk 100% flist so Tommy and Eden's ambition basically is to be the number one Flack producer in this part of the country that's kind of his ideal okay he liked the way the cows look they were they're a beef looking animal but the ability to produce like a dairy animal so okay kind of ticked all his boxes and every every every Farmer's own kind of likes and wants and he thought the FL was done enough for him so so what's unique here I suppose about this Farm it's an indoor system yeah uh they're indoor the whole time yeah and there's a lot of automation here on the farm lot of automation so weight classes Farm can of fully automated so that one mean our feeding's done or milking done or scraping's done all by robots and they're people will say so what's the farmers doing the robots are only kind of good as they are managed you know you go to a lot open days and stuff and n had always talk you know they're not going to run the business for you but they will definitely help it they definitely save labor if we hadn't the robots you'd probably need another two staff or whatever to get through the amount of Labor that it takes that the robots take off you and the robots take that human error away from the farming too you're not worrying right if I got good staff to milk these cows are they going to be done right the robots can of take care of that and then the information after the robotss is second and on okay I can see exactly what C are doing if they're sick or they ruminating everything very good so look we we'll have a look soide yeah so you installed two robots first yeah so initially they went with two a5s and the left room for the third one and they said we'll go with the we'll see how the cows milk and we'll get up and running before we do anything further so two a5s one to the right one here and one to the left so one central unit per two and then you're in for you stations as well just to feed Cals so once they get up that there up and going in uh March of 2023 then they went for the third L A5 and things has never looked back since the shed was a tight capacity in Mars time he had he was making maybe 126 127 cows and the two robots were doing it but you were afraid of the heers losing out so went for the third robot and there hasn't been a problem since you know okay there's never an issue with collecting CS I I don't think I've collected Co maybe in three or four weeks okay all you'd have to be worried about is maybe one halfer maybe for three or four days and she knows she knows what to do when you come in in the morning say what information you pulling up so basically my stepbystep routine when you go in in the morning clear out an alarm so you're going to look all the time on your reports so the two main ones is you collect cows so is there a cow that I need to go fetch more often than not there's not and then we're going to go to our other head work list so that's basically a c with status do I need look at her vment there will I give that to her or does she need a tube but we try stay away from the tubes if we possibly can we shouldn't have an issue with just cuz we keep the place as clean as possible cars are being milked when they want it's all it's all to do with what the car wants not what we want so they have access to food whenever they want access to milk so if you have a if you have a cow with Mercedes it shows you up straight away as soon as she's milked and then before I come in in the morning even I can look on my L Horizon app when I'm eating the breakfast and I know what's ahead of me before I kind of do it okay yeah fine so you're it's a central unit here so so the central unit there is for these two robots you have your te dip there which runs for the three robots and then you have all your washing acids and stuff detergents in that central unit so everything's very compact you know there's nothing you haven't a big massive amount of builing for three robots if few were milk maybe 140 cars you'd have a lot bigger footprint for a paror yeah that and then we have our automatic uh foot bath system then there too y so it works well one to side we we have quite a lot of free time so getting a car in milking might be how many milkings so we're milking 3.3 at the minute now depending on our cows at loation we can change that so L would actually talk all the time you need to keep looking at your milk access but basically our our Optimum milking is around the 9.5 L Mark so so when you're milking a cow you want them ideally 9 1/2 L otherwise it's kind of a waste anything less is a waste and you don't want any more so about 3.3 what's your average milk production at the minute H per cow it is 31 l so at about 4.2 fat and 3.3 or 3.29 protein so cows are in good order there we a lot of ones CED in maybe this last 6 weeks and that would definitely help it yeah but with indoor system you have always that consistency you know you're not worried right my cars are going to go way down in the winter and then we're carving all year round so you always have a fresh her and that definitely helps because you have Tre off Farm labor you need the place to pay you know people need wages and stuff and that's that's that's why you're kind of cing all year around it's a lot handier to do one big bust but you need to you need to keep the milk flowing and ultimately the robots need to keep working too what's your annual production per car oh uh you be be looking somewhere per lactation The Good the good second or third Cavs we have nothing over third or fourth Cav in around the 11,000 L where's uh say 10 1/2 to 11 then for a halfer You' be looking anywhere from 6 and 1/2 to 7 and 1/2 give or take so they're they're well fit to milk definitely are how much ration are they get in then all P yield it's all uh feed the so basically the cows that's producing more are getting rewarded but the cows that aren't aren't they're they're not being restricted either so I think it starts at somewhere around the three kilos so we kind of feed these cows as much from forage as we can yeah so coming in here you swear you were in Austria or Germany or somewhere like that so it's not your it's not your typical Farm yeah yeah so we're not we're not looking at the Black and Whites if I go to a farm with Black and Whites you're kind of you're looking at yourself one of these but uh these are What's called the FL yes most them uh most of them there's one one German car and the rest are all Austrian Bas okay so what's what's their temperament like temperament they go up they'll never know you all they'll go over and lick it they're not afraid they're all they walk about at their own speed they do whatever they think themselves you'll never you'll never push them they they always have to be lad yes but they're they're very Placid animal I have to say yeah you have no issue with them kicking even when you're working at them in the crush and stuff you have no issues yes that's one big major even a c you have no issues with them you know you'd never be afraid now here it's farm and you have to watch yourself but there's never we've had no issues now T wood so yes what age you cing down at the first C so you we try cing down between 24 and 26 yeah if we can best at all but uh in Austria they tell you more around the 26 to 28 months so we're kind of we're going with what the austrians say and kind of adapting to what we have basically okay now they're a good carow now for troll and twins I must say they're big you probably have a 7% twin rate anyway yeah they have a high to give twins definitely do like weed scan cows here see there you go we of cows here scanned usually every 6 weeks yeah and when we would know you'd definitely have over the 7% twin R definitely would okay so bedding as we're Bing Obviously good source for bedding is heart piz so you're OB you couldn't get it any easier so if if we couldn't B the cow of Pizer else could so it's like the signed bed in the UK quite a bit it's the same principle just a deep bed exactly that's just a deep bed like our cell counts always nearly always under the 100,000 I think it's actually around 68,000 at the minute so as you can see like cars are comfy they're content they're doing as they please okay easy fix cubicle easy fixed cubicle easy fix ation system okay very happy with them I have to say one broke in two years that's it okay good so you you have an ariation system as well yeah so that that works out well we typically only really have it for the summer but it doesn't do any harm in the winter as long as it's not too cold okay like it's as you can see there's very little cobwebs or whatever in that shed you know for cars to be in all the time is it on 24/7 247 okay yeah we probably could do with switching off but we see no real need at the minute you have a lot of gates then the pull down gates are so these are the pull are they handy you can get a car by yourself no problem you're never in need of two people and that's what you have to do yeah there's enough to do without getting someone else to help move cattle with it yeah okay demonstrated there yeah so if I'm taking a cow up or a cow across simply pull it down latches in and then other cows can't open it yeah and then as you take her close it behind you and then she can't go but behind you you know but usually if you're going and getting a cow she knows where she has to go and she'll she'll usually go for it yeah she's a routine so you've the so the L Discovery yeah yeah how many them one just the one we only need one so that's just basically automated scraping it's got two routes so one route is our kitchen side so it'll go in a loop do these two passages charge then do these two so it uses a vacuum just basically sucks the dong and releases it there's a tank here and tank down at the bottom okay okay so as you see like they're pretty clean all them cars are pretty clean how often is it running so it goes it depends usually every hour and a half to two hours okay so it works like cows there's never a buildup now there's only 100 cows in this shed at the minute but it's car numbers increase now you'd have to make sure she's gone and you went for say two small ones here versus one big one any reason no real reason just whatever was bought at the time whatever Tommy wanted and Eden wanted they kind of went with it they're very easy cleaned like just give it a bit of a twirl with your hand there you go it works your water's always clean I supposed with the Pete you'd be more afraid of we bit more dark brown the cows M and stuff so yeah okay so you have a small draft in area here then have you yeah so on our system I can actually drave cows on me phone so L Horizon cow 2161 I'll draft her and then she's automatically drafted if she's in heat yeah close down meate and then you've headlocks her if you need to go to the crush run over the crush and okay yeah it works out pretty handy you went for the brush as well went for the brush as well there's one either side yeah they do like it like you you'd notice if it wasn't going they you can get wires and stuff broke but usually now there's no bother with it yeah they make use of it anyway oh they make use of it they make sure they comy before anything else yeah they'll they'll they not be long telling it I see yeah yeah good just looking at your slurry management here then so you you have your main tanks in there so we have a tank either side of the cow house and then when they get full we transfer them these I think they were old pig houses or something yeah they just again as well so transfer to them and then on the other Farms if we're stuck for slurry it's slurry time transfer over so yeah so you're all the time moving slurry with an indoor ha you're all the time can of get it right for your fields and yes give no shortage or slurry anyway yeah so you're Dairy here anyway yeah yeah so in here too we uh change our milk sock and stuff so our milk sock here there's two change one in the morning then change one in the evening yeah we have a wash machine and to wash calf jackets and it's actually quite warm in here so we just dry our calf jackets so as you can like the cleaner you can keep things for CES the better um yeah there's no buffer tank here but we're not stuck for free time with the robots so we're all right okay and then yeah that's basically it you have all your washing up you have your boilers you have everything you need yeah so when the make the make man does come yeah was he connects on he connects on where does the make going is it no the robots are stopped okay the robots stopped for 1550 minutes to wash whenever he's H whenever make he comes out every second so at the same time typically or always always nearly at 3:00 okay so it's before we need milk for Cales and all so it works out it works out well F yes good so you have a nice tray there underneath as well nice tray there I can actually change number one so yeah so there's no mess in the ground there much no mess in the ground go straight in the sink yeah you you hose it up in the inside of your slave there like you'd think maybe your sock would be a bit dirtier with the pain but as you can see like that's fair clean like you no lumps running and then hose in there it's not too bad then all the dirts gone you know your floor not dirty or nothing yes I'm getting slippy no so how do you know there's no make going to come there and El say cuz uh your lightss red so the milk's going through number two at the minute okay were you able to do that or does it change over it's it'll change over when I tick it so once I have it changed then your milk is start flowing too uh so that's kind of it's food proof like you can't can't really do it wrong how after would you change that oh once number one is in the evening number two is in the morning usually it could go right nearly an hour after you change the other one so they change once a day each of them like it's very easy tightened you kind of know here if you're first on the farm you going to the milk sock straight away and then if you're last leaving you check them mil so that's basically how we work it yeah you know you can't you have to whenever there's so many people on the farm you have to kind of leave it that everyone knows their role I know whoever's here does a routine at a particular time so you wearing a mu tank yeah mu tank yeah and then that there used just used to be for when he was taking cattle the factory and stuff yeah just so you could load your lry down below and where you go yeah and that's just again your narrow passage then your VOR drives [Music] around [Music]

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Id: GFZXk0PW4y0

Length: 16min 48sec (1008 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 03 2024