Loose Housed Barn - Soft Bedding Material

Benefits

Feed

• Minimise pasture damage when soils are overly wet or prevent overgrazing (eg when pasture is insufficient to meet full herd demand). This should increase pasture production
• Better feed utilisation compared with paddock feeding of supplements
• Minimising pugging or overgrazing may increase pasture production

Herd

• Better herd monitoring may be possible, e.g. heat detection, animal welfare, BCS.
• Reduction in herd lameness may be possible, e.g. from reduction of cows standing in mud, or on concrete

Management

• Opportunities to to reuse used bedding and apply to crop land or pasture
• Reduce farm maintenance costs (associated with paddock renovations following pugging, herd or machinery traffic)

Limitations

• Minor to medium capital outlay to establish
• Increased building and machinery repair and maintenance
• Business more reliant on quality supplements being grown or purchased (vulnerable to season price changes)
• Supplementary feed costs typically greater than pasture
• Consents required
• Effluent management requires additional activities (to compost and dispose of the bedding)
• Potential for increased regulatory attention with odour emissions (compost) and community complaints if bedding not handled well

System design considerations

Structure

• Location in relation to herd access - close to dairy (milking shed) is convenient but also dependent on location of feed storage areas and facilities intended use of facility
• Sitting in relation to prevailing wind direction and sun to maximise drying of bedding
• Consenting is reasonably straightforward so long as leachate captured
• Roofed structures require structural engineering to take in to account wind, snowfalls, etc.

Feed

• If being used for feeding part or all of feed requirement, as most are, then a separate feed area should be added and a supply management plan required
• Allow for increased feed bunker area and machinery if increasing supplementary feeding
• Aim for the least traffic movements possible between feed and barn storage area

Herd

• Provide correct stocking rates and feed space per cow. Minimum 9m²/cow for use over extended periods of time eg. used for weeks during winter. Minimum 70 cm of feed face per cow.

Management

• Liquids leaching through bedding should enter effluent system
• Concrete area to store and compost bedding material once used should allow leachate to enter effluent system
• New bedding material storage (and requirement to keep dry)

Other jobs

• Weekly "ripping' or turning to encourage drying
• Associated ongoing maintenance costs (usually annually but depends on amount of use, weekly maintenance routine, and amount of natural drying) such as:
  • Cleaning out bedding from barns
  • Storing and composting bedding materials
  • Applying composted material to paddocks
  • Reintroducing clean bedding

Adviser tips

• Case studies and analysis indicate that once built, many farmers increase cows and levels of supplementary feeding
• Costs of feeding supplements is typically 1.5x per purchase cost of feed per kg
• Consider putting alongside a feedpad if this already exists

Significant component costs of infrasturcture:

• Site preparation earthworks
• Base materials (eg clay, rock)
• Roof and trusses
• Concrete feeding area/s (for cows to stand on and/or feed to be fed out on)
• Bedding (woodchip, annually) plus storage area
• Concrete storage pad (for composting bedding)

Possible additional costs:

• Dairy company shares
• Feed bunkers
• First year feed inventory (if needed)
• Additional stock
• Ripper (to loosen/aerate woodchip bedding)