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Farmer sees effect of long-term cow comfort study

Dairy farmers have learned a lot about cow comfort and how the right facilities can help their bottom line.  One of the farmers that helped researchers learn more is Mitch Breunig from Mystic Valley Farms near Sauk City, Wisconsin.  He worked with University of Wisconsin researcher Dr. Nigel Cook over the past dozen years in what started as a comparison of sand bedding versus mattresses.  Breunig tells Brownfield the study evolved into looking at cow behavior.  “We took like a still shot (photograph) every minute, and then they piece those together by tracking like twelve cows through the farm, and did like a 24-hour sort of ‘what did this cow do for 24 hours?’ trying to determine if they were laying down, if they were standing, what they were doing?”

Breunig tells Brownfield the study then focused on overall cow comfort.  “Based on that research, they determined sand was a better bedding material than mattresses were, but they also started looking into stall size, and that was sort of the basis for their stall size (recommendations) and they’ve continually sort of looked at how cows lay down, standing, how they lunge, get up and down, and they just continue to look at what is the ideal stall size for a cow.”

Breunig says there is no perfect stall size since a two-year-old is smaller than a later lactation animal that’s had seven calves.

He tells Brownfield removing the brisket boards and giving the cows more room made a noticeable change in milk production.  “Especially out of our older cows, we got three or four pounds of milk pretty easily.  Our highest group of cows that we have on the farm right now, their average peak is 146 pounds, and that’s the average cow on our farm producing that at her peak.  Before we were probably in the low 140’s but we couldn’t crack that next barrier.”