A2O-Lancaster Farming, Saturday, June 1,1985
BY JOYCE BUPP
Staff Correspondent
YORK - Although Robert and
Rodney Smyser joke about it,
wheelbarrows are again in vogue
as part of the bam cleaning
equipment at their Richlawn
Farms, East Berlin Road.
For many years, the hand
pushed manure conveyances had
fallen from favor in their 66-tie
stall bam, replaced by gutter
cleaners and a pioneering manure
pumping and handling system. But
a more recent addition to the
operation has brought the
wheelbarrow back into the picture.
Dry cow handling has been a
concern of the Smyser brothers for
some time. In the past, they would
either hold dry cows in the tie
stalls, with the milking herd, or
run them into a lot on an adjoining
farm. Neither solution, though,
was really satisfactory.
“We had too many fat cows; it
was a feeding problem,” Robert
relates. “And we couldn’t follow-
the wall with treated lumber.
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up, dry treat cows, as well when
they were over on the other farm in
the pasture. Since we had no box
stalls, too many time calves were
bom in the gutter.”
An attractive, airy, dry cow and
maternity bam added two years
ago is helping solve these
problems. Relying heavily on Penn
State engineering suggestions, the
Smysers took a basic Agway metal
pole bam and modified it to meet
their specifications. The 36 x 72
bam, with treated wood around the
inside of the bottom walls, has
eight 12 x 12 individual-care box
stalls, and a loafing area for the
dry group.
The dry cow facility connects to
the far end of the tie-stall bam, via
a cemented, enclosed ramp. As
cows complete their lactations,
they’re dry-treated, moved from
the milking bam to one of the in
dividual pens, and follow-up
dipped every day for a week. Any
cows with mastitis problems
during that lactation are again
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milked out at the end of a week,
and dry treated again. They then
join the group of dry cows in the
lofting area at the opposite end of
the new facility from the box stalls.
“It’s really helped,” affirms
Robert of their dry-cow care.
“There’s not nearly as much
mastitis.”
Box stalls are cleaned of manure
and any wet bedding every day,
with the wastes simply moved
down the ramp and. into the
milking barn gutters—by
wheelbarrow.
“It’s not a labor-saving barn,”
they admit. “But we wouldn’t do
without it.”
Straw is chopped and added to
box stalls twice weekly, with
Flip up windows for added ventilation and outside grazing pens are two of the
features the Smysers incorporated into their dry cow and maternity facility.
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pack ever builds up, and oc- “If we had to do it over, we’d
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for a period, and limed down as a lots for all the pens, even those on
disinfecting measure. the north side,” figures Robert.
“Fat cow” syndrome is mostly a Ventilation is all natural, with
problem of the past, since hand side, flip-up windows kept open
feeding in the box stalls allows whenever weather permits. A
individual attention. Timothy hay relatively low roof keeps breezes
goes to the dry group, along with a coming through the open ends
little silage, which is fed in heavier down near the cows. While no fan
volumes to the close springers. installations were planned, por-
One modification Smysers made tables could easily be set up if an
are doors which access four of the individual cow’s pen warranted
stalls, on the barn’s south side, to them.
outside lots. Purpose of the 20 x6O Individual cow care, geared
lots, one lot per two individual toward high production, has long
pens, is to get the animals out on been standard at Richlawn, with a
fresh grass as much as possible, rolling herd average on 75 head of
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