Buffer feed cows outside or keep em in?

C4d78

Up until now been going into covers of 700-800 & just buffer feeding bales during milking times at head feed.
Covers are dropping fast thou.
What way are lads feeding silage to cows now if there’s no Grass left?
Have they bit the bullet and brought them in?
Or feeding along a wire in a saracafice paddock?
Or feeding inside for few hours and leaving out to bare paddock?
Ideally I’d like to keep em out for obvious reasons of being cleaner etc but with 190 cows ring feeders aren’t really an option so does silage get wasted if thrown out by wire or what are lads experiences.
Thanks.

kk_man

Feeding here under wire with a diet feeder. Cows getting baled silage and 3kgs soya hulls, Very little waste. If you check ground after theres a small bit of hulls left but you,d be a long time gathering a bucket! Anythings better than feeding inside. We have day and night paddocks so can have it ready before milking. Have a Keenan 100 so not ideal for bales, need a good supply of shear bolts but were getting better!

Dakota Dan

kk_man wrote: »

Feeding here under wire with a diet feeder. Cows getting baled silage and 3kgs soya hulls, Very little waste. If you check ground after theres a small bit of hulls left but you,d be a long time gathering a bucket! Anythings better than feeding inside. We have day and night paddocks so can have it ready before milking. Have a Keenan 100 so not ideal for bales, need a good supply of shear bolts but were getting better!

Are milk yields and solids holding well with that diet

Mooooo

Some are keeping em in by day for feed8ng and then out by night. Most seem to be putting feed under the wire, others are using feed trailers and go8ng from paddock to paddock with the cows. Could you set up a paddock near the yard so that they could come in at the feed face to eat and go out to lie down, and close off the cubicles may be?

kk_man

They're doing 24 litres BF4.21 but protein is poor as grass is being replaced at 3.35

freedominacup

Cows eating 15-16kg dm after morning milking in the shed. They have access to every foot of feed barrier in the place so plenty of room and no bullying to speak of. Heifers and timid cows will simply move to where the going is easier. They're gone out with little more than a couple of wheelbarrows left behind by 11.30. The first row or two Hoover that bit up in a couple of mins after evening milking. From today they are getting another 2kg dm in ringfeeders in the paddock after evening milking. Whatever grass that we have available is given to them in the evening as well so anyone who goes for the feeders is losing out on grass and vise versa. I'd rather set fire to the sheds than house them.

Feeding in calf heifers under a wire since yesterday. We've fed cows under the wire in the past but I don't know how well it would work at the volumes we're feeding atm. Feeding in the shed is working well for the past month. All fed with a diet feeder.

TheFarrier

Neighbors here milking similar numbers to you OP, cows left in 2 hours before evening milking and left go out after morning milking at their own pace. 5-6 bales a day in the head feed, plus whatever they’re getting in the parlour too.
Some grass in front of them too but how much exactly I’m not sure

pms7

Round feeder in field, otherwise looking to come back in straight away.
Keep them off cubicles, or else lime, had access here for week, might have stayed in a night, 6 mastitis cases last 3 weeks

blackdog1

Mooooo wrote:

One morning I need to get the cows done early dumbass here let's the wire down directing to parlour and cows head for a gallop to the last fecking field on the pasaage

Gawddawggonnit wrote:

Putting it into the ground with the last few days. A mix inc moha and clovers planted 13days is flying. About 6†tall now and ready to tiller. Can’t post a pic, says file too large...

freedominacup wrote:

Cows eating 15-16kg dm after morning milking in the shed. They have access to every foot of feed barrier in the place so plenty of room and no bullying to speak of. Heifers and timid cows will simply move to where the going is easier. They're gone out with little more than a couple of wheelbarrows left behind by 11.30. The first row or two Hoover that bit up in a couple of mins after evening milking. From today they are getting another 2kg dm in ringfeeders in the paddock after evening milking. Whatever grass that we have available is given to them in the evening as well so anyone who goes for the feeders is losing out on grass and vise versa. I'd rather set fire to the sheds than house them.

freedominacup wrote:

Feeding in calf heifers under a wire since yesterday. We've fed cows under the wire in the past but I don't know how well it would work at the volumes we're feeding atm. Feeding in the shed is working well for the past month. All fed with a diet feeder.

I'm basically doing the same. Pain in the arse back liming cubicles when I should be power washing them. 2 cases of mastitis this week so now I'm disenfecting them twice a week now too... The joys of it...