RETHINKING MILKING PERMISSION

A previous Cow Corner article, “What should automatic milking permission do?” defined 3 functions of milking permission, or milk access. The functions included, maximize robot capacity, avoid unnecessary milkings, and keep the line at the robot short. All of those could be summarized as, preventing cows from being milked when they should not be milked, or conversely, making sure the right cows are milked at the right time.

What if you have unused robot capacity? Can less restrictive milking permission improve cow flow and decrease free time or idle time? The short answer is, no. Think of milking permission like the brakes in your pickup truck. If you have your foot on the brake, releasing the brake will make you go faster – but once the pedal is fully released, pulling up on it will not increase your speed. You have to step on the accelerator. Less restrictive milking permission is like pulling up on the brake pedal. There are a few problems with that approach.

First, Idle time is a 24-hour average. If you have 15% idle time on the dashboard or monitor board, the average hour has 15% idle time, but some hours may have no idle time and other hours may have 30% idle time. The hours with 30% idle time really don’t matter. Which cows will you prioritize during the hours with the least idle time? The cows with 50 pounds of expected yield or the cows with 20 pounds of expected yield? Milking permission should make sure the right cows are milked at the busiest times of the day. The brakes have to work when you come to a busy intersection.

If milking permission is set correctly, the right cows are being milked at the right time. In that case, making milking permission less restrictive may result in more milkings, and less idle time, but the extra milkings will probably go to cows that do not need more frequent milking – like pulling up on the fully released brake pedal.

The correct way to increase milkings, or decrease idle time, is to determine which cows need to be milked more frequently. Then determine what is limiting milkings for those cows. If fresh heifers are not milking as frequently as they should, review the training program. If cows with long lactations are the problem, review the breeding program. If mature fresh cows are not coming to the robot, look for transition problems. Forage quality, and balance between the feed in the bunk and the feed in the robot can also be involved. Don’t overlook the time people spend in the barn, and the availability of feed in the bunk. Any one of these, or combinations of them, can be like the accelerator pedal that increases cow flow, to decrease idle time, and increase milkings.

At Cow Corner, I can help you put all of these factors together to set the right milking permission for your barn. Then I can help you troubleshoot the bottlenecks that are limiting cow flow in your barn.