Community
23 October, 2024
Shelter could help overcome challenges
PRINCETOWN farmer Steve Brown thinks his dairy shelters might answer a lot of challenges facing the industry.
Not only are the two clear roof, deep litter Dairy Shelters Australia shelters helping to reduce pressure on his paddocks, keep the cows and calves warmer and healthier and contribute to increased milk production, they’re boosting the image of dairy farming and easing pressure on staff.
“From a cow management and husbandry perspective, I see these shelters as a good way of addressing the challenges we have in this country,” Mr Brown said.
“People want to know that we’re taking care of our cows and the shelters can be part of that.
“They’re more efficient and make management easier; I don’t know what we’d do without them now.”
Mr Brown, and wife Jo, farm in partnership with their son Travis and his partner Sarah just a few kilometres from the Great Ocean Road.
The family has been on land for about 25 years and milk 500 mostly Holsteins on a total of 365 hectares.
After losing access to about 140 hectares of leased land a few years ago, the Browns needed another way to maintain numbers and production without damaging their home farm.
The answer was a dairy shelter for the cows which was introduced in May 2023. It was such a success they returned to Dairy Shelters Australia this year for two more adjoining purpose-built shelters for housing and rearing young stock.
“We were sitting behind cows for hours to get them to the dairy,” Mr Brown said.
“We thought if we put in a decent feed pad and a shelter, we could address cow comfort and lack of staff, which are among the big issues dairy farmers have to face.”
The five adjoining cow shelters next to the dairy cover about 4000 square metres and the cows are voting with their feet, according to Mr Brown.
“The cows have really changed,” he said.
“Years ago, we’d have to get behind them at night to bring them home. Now we’ve got a gate break with a timer on it that goes off at 2.15pm and they wander home at their own pace.
“We send them to the shelter at night but in the mornings, they want to go to the paddocks.
“They’re telling us – daytime they want to be in paddocks, at night they’re happy to eat what we mix for them on the pad.”
Mr Brown said Travis had drove the discussion on the shelters and they were pleased with their investment and decided to double up this year with a separate facility for calves and heifers.
He believes more south-west Victorian farmers will look at shelters.
“We’ve had quite a few come and look at it and say they want to do it,” Mr Brown said.