Time to move onwards and upwards
Time to move onwards and upwards
Ryan Park Farm nestles within the rolling Cornish countryside close to Bodmin moor and has been home for the Harvey family for two generations.
Milk has been the sole income to support two families, but with the dairy enterprise being under intense scrutiny for the last decade and major changes occurring to meet profit requirements, the Harvey's future had to be seriously considered.
Fred senior and wife Esther farm in partnership with their son Fred, daughter-in-law Debbie and 4 year old son Jack. With the need to provide an income for the two families and no spare cash for extra farm help on a regular basis, Fred realised that a herd of 80 cows being milked through a second-hand, 30 year old 6-abreast parlour was not the way forward.
"We like our cows," said Fred. "We like to see them grazing in the fields around our farm and we wanted to stay in milking. Consequently I had to come up with something that was going to work and pay for our future. I told Dad that I was going to see a robot milker working in Devon and invited him to come along. He said yes - you could have knocked me down with a feather !"
Some six years later, Ryan Park Farm operates with 2 ASTRONAUT A3 units milking 100 cows, plus a further 40 in-calf heifers and 40 heifer calves waiting to be introduced during the next two years. Fred stated, "Our objective is to get 1,000,000 litres of milk this year (07) and possibly 1,200,000 litres next year from 120 cows."
"Currently, we are averaging 28 to 30 litres per cow, with a rolling yearly average of 8,100 litres, which is increasing. Our ASTRONAUT A3's first started milking 80 cows in October 2006 and although we have a few 10 or 11 lactation cows, no cows have had to be culled. They all took to the LELY ASTRONAUT and we expect between a 10 to 15% increase in milk yield as the cows and fresh heifers settle into the milking system."
During the time the Harvey's were looking at their future milking operation, none of the new ASTRONAUT machines were installed in the UK, so the family saw the A3 via the internet on the LELY website. "We had already made up our minds that the LELY system was the best, so we put our faith in the company and local technical LELY support staff by placing an order for these new machines in March 2006. Fred was determined that a decision be made - either he would have his new milking regime in place by Christmas 2006 or be completely out of milking.
Groundwork started in June during the week of the Royal Cornwall Show and meant that the old parlour had to be moved into an adjacent building, allowing the cows to be milked whilst the two new ASTRONAUT units were installed. All work, other than the flooring, was carried out by the two Fred's.
"We stopped milking in the old system on 3 October and immediately started using the new ASTRONAUT units. We'd had one heck of a time for several weeks, but all of our efforts paid dividends. The cows were quick to learn during their 2 week training period, with the entire herd all trained and fully appreciating LELY freedom milking by Christmas.
Grazing cows is very much a priority at Ryan Park Farm with 80 acres of grass proportioned into a two-paddock A & B system. Cows have the freedom of choice when to be milked, using either of the two ASTRONAUT units and returning to a fresh paddock each day.
Subject to weather conditions, an electric fence controls the amount of grass available with buffer feeding being provided in four ring feeders. Rations include soya and rape additives being hand-mixed into whole crop and maize silage.
This year, due to the excessive amount of early sunshine and late rain, haylage and 2007 double chopped grass has been on the menu, resulting in an increase of yields. A nutritional specialist, David Passmore, provides regular assistance in maintaining the cows' dietary requirements.
Two LELY out-of-parlour COSMIX feeders are shortly to be installed, which will allow each cow's feeding to be monitored even better from the data provided from the ASTRONAUT.
Eight months into their new milking regime, Fred Harvey is pleased to report that the ASTRONAUT units have delivered what he originally thought was achievable.