EARL Bérard Beauvais

The Lely Vector feeding robot has radically changed the way we work on our family farm, EARL Bérard Beauvais, which is located in the Sarthe region of France. Saving time, animal performance, working comfort... I'd like to share with you my experience of this transition to automated feeding in the fattening section.  

Together with my wife and two employees, I run a farm covering 166 hectares of permanent grassland, crops and a cider orchard. The farm has 140 suckler cows for a total herd of 350 cattle, plus 4 duck hen houses for pre-feeding. A farm on a human scale, but with complex technical requirements, particularly in terms of feed.

Before the robot: a cumbersome and inflexible organisation

Before the arrival of the Vector, the animals were fed using a mixing bowl and an uncoiler, which required two tractors and between 2 and 3 hours' work a day. We distributed feed twice a day: one bowl for the young bulls and another for the rest of the herd (suckers, pregnant cows, gensisses, etc.). The rations were not adapted to each batch, which limited the precision of the feed. To encourage ingestion and limit refusals, the forage also had to be pushed back several times a day, which was also time-consuming. Plus, leaving the feeding of the animals to a third party can generate errors that cause major fluctuations in our GMQ targets. Our objective was to automate to save time and precision - The choice of the Lely Vector was motivated by the desire to make feeding more reliable while saving time.After several visits to equipped farms and a meeting with Lely at Space 2015, I decided to take the plunge. We'd been aware of digital tools for a long time, so we had no particular difficulty getting the system up and running.

A transformed daily routine

Today, the time we spend on feeding has dropped to less than an hour a day. The arduous tasks have disappeared: there's no need to push the fodder back, no more heavy handling. All that's left to do is to supply the Vector's kitchen, which is a quick and easy process. The robot now allows us to distribute 7 different rations, adapted to the age or physiological stage of the animals. This was unthinkable with our previous system, and it allows us to make better use of our feed.

Saving fuel and time

Since we stopped using tractors for feeding, we've been able to reinvest the time we've saved in developing a new activity: ducks. And contrary to what you might think, the robot doesn't take us away from our animals. On the contrary: it frees up time for us to observe them, keep an eye on them and follow their progress, all of which are essential for a calm and serene herd.

Support and reliability

The Lely Center provides highly efficient 24-hour monitoring. We have had an exceptional incident, which was resolved in less than 24 hours. The cost of maintenance is an expense that needs to be taken into account, especially in the meat sector where margins are often more limited. However, it remains a coherent investment in terms of time savings, regularity and working comfort.

The positive effects were not long in coming

• +50 g/day of GMQ gained, simply thanks to regularity,
• Better feed efficiency throughout the herd,
• Cows in better body condition at the end of winter, on the same ration as before.
• At least 1? hours' work saved per day
• Very few refusals, even with forages of variable quality, with no noticeable impact on the overall quality of the ration.

Here, our robot distributes small quantities every 1.5 hours or so, ensuring that the feed is always fresh. This stimulates feed intake, without creating an overload at the trough.

 

My assessment in 3 words: efficiency, peace of mind, reliability

If I had to sum up what the Vector has brought to our farm, I'd say :

• Efficiency, with precise, optimised feeding.
• Peace of mind, thanks to time savings and regularity.
• Reliability, with a system that works continuously and is well supervised.