Notes on the construction of barns
In an attempt to address the issues related to animal welfare (BA) in many areas in the dairy basin argentine observed constructs varied stalls. So that we are all understanding the concept transcribe the definition of "animal welfare" of the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA): "An animal is in a good state of welfare if it is clinically healthy, comfortable, well nourished, safe, able to express innate behaviour, and if you are not suffering from pain, fear or distress." The weather conditions are one of the main factors that affect the BA, and we see this regularly in the drums with heat stress or the neighborhood caused by the rains. To protect the rodeo dairy of these weather has a major impact on the production of lactating dairy cows (5 or 6 lt/cow milking/day).
The central basin milk of the country have the highest density of dairy farms of Argentina and is located in the region with the highest number of days with heat stress. As we can see in the following map, from Parchment to the north, the cows are exposed to 120 or 150 days of heat stress. Reason enough to explain the higher concentration of warehouses existing in this area (according to survey of the friends of Todoagro 60% of the buildings found in Cordoba).
Also, and not less important, is the strong impact that has mud on the performance of the production. Both the heat and the mud leads to a lower dry matter intake and conversion efficiency of generating a significant drop in the production accounted for between 10% and 20% depending on the conditions.
Types of sheds in Argentina.
Among the options for construction of sheds and the big difference they do in the bed on which the cows are going to take. In Argentina we have seen 4 types of bed (and according to your choice, vary the surface to roofing, total costs, and also the operational costs): beds of compost added substrate (12 m2/cow), beds freestall of sand or beds of rubber (9 m2/cow) and the beds of earth (18 m2/cow). These latter, the houses with beds of earth, are $ 300/cow more expensive than the freestall by the extension of the covered area, but promise to lower operating costs by not having to add substrate (peanut shells, etc) or by recycling the sand and minor handling of slurry. The sheds of compost have a total cost similar to that of the freestalls. Without a doubt, that the freestall of sand is the most tested in the world and the cow rests very comfortably on it while achieving high yields. The beds of earth, of being able to keep dry for good air circulation and the chiseled relevant, also exhibit the well-being necessary for high-performance animal. To the left is a diagram of a cabin, with a bed of earth robot (6 robots) for milking 360 cows.
The beds of compost are the most widely used currently, and as we have seen in the following graph with data of Dr. Juan Monge describing the growth of drum-building these sheds:
Costs compared
Stables on the drums robotic
It is observed that the entire stables freestall they are built to the drums on own land. On land rented 70% of the buildings are sheds with beds of compost (heated bed) or land (bed cold):
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