A comparison of parlors

WEST BEND, Wis. – When the Roden family fired up their rotary parlor for its first milking March 8, they did not anticipate how quickly cows would adjust to a different system. By the fourth day, Rick Roden told his extra help to stay home because cows had the hang of it.
“I was really surprised how fast our cows adapted to the rotary,” said Roden, part owner of Roden Echo Valley Farm. “The first morning was tough. However, I was shocked by day two when three-quarters of the cows or better had it figured out. They are so calm riding on there. Cows chew their cud and look totally relaxed.”
Roden farms with his parents, Bob and Cindy, near West Bend where they milk 850 cows three times a day in a 40-stall rotary parlor. Roden was part of a producer panel on the PDPW Dairy Signal discussing milk parlor management. Joining him was Zoey Nelson, chief operative officer of Brooks Farms near Waupaca, who farms with her dad, Ron. The Brooks family milks 600 cows twice a day in a double-16 herringbone parlor built in 2017.
“We’ve seen a lot of rotaries going in, and we liked the consistency of the rotary from an employ-ee standpoint,” Roden said.
Moving from a double-8 herringbone built in 1969 into the rotary was a dream come true for both cows and employees. The parlor allowed the Rodens to return to milking three times a day – a practice they abandoned due to not getting cows through their old parlor fast enough.
“We had nice scheduled shifts for employees because we were milking around the clock in the old parlor,” Roden said. “In the new parlor, we’re getting a little creative with scheduling because we’re not nearly to the capacity of a 40-stall rotary.”
Three employees handle milking – one prepping, one attaching and one bringing cows up to the parlor. Cost and maintenance steered the family away from doing a fully automated rotary.
“We felt we could put a body in there and maybe have a little less maintenance,” Roden said. “We wanted to have the most technology possible yet keep it somewhat simplistic.”
When a cow enters the parlor, the first person’s job is to prep her. The milker stands in the same spot to do their work as cows come in. A second person stands a few stalls over to put milk ma-chines on, which allows for a 60- to 90-second stimulation time. A spray robot does the post dipping.
“Ensuring employees stay put gives a cow consistency as she’s going around the rotary,” Roden said.
In the new parlor, each milking takes about 4.5 hours. Every shift is about six hours, which in-cludes milking and cleanup. The Rodens continue to run their herringbone parlor for fresh cows and treated cows, which is where employees begin their shift. The morning crew milks six morn-ings while the night crew milks six nights, and everybody milks three afternoons.
“Employees are still getting approximately the same number of hours as in the old parlor; it’s just that one day is short, and one day is long,” Roden said. “Until we get more cows to make a long-er milking shift, this is how we have to do it.”
Brooks Farms has 13 employees, eight of which are on the milking crew. Prior to building their new parlor, the family milked 200 cows in a double-6 herringbone built in the early 1970s. Nelson said they spent three years putting pen to paper and touring farms before deciding on the type of parlor they wanted. They ended up choosing the same style they had before – a herringbone.
“That may seem a little stagnant or like a lateral move, but our old parlor was also a Germania, and you can’t beat the quality and durability of that equipment,” Nelson said. “The service the company offers was also a factor for us. Furthermore, we like the side profile for milking.”
Nelson and her dad discussed options with employees, who completely ruled out a parallel par-lor.
“Don’t just think of the cows when building a parlor – the people make up a big part of it too,” Nel-son said. “We ensured our employees have a nice place to work and a place they can be proud to work at.”
To meet goals of cleanliness and quietness, Brooks Farms decided to put in a basement-style parlor.
“We wanted the cleanest, quietest parlor for both cows and employees,” Nelson said. “The way to do that was a basement, which a lot of builders don’t like to do nowadays. Our parlor guy told us there are two types of basement parlors – the ones that leak and the ones that don’t leak yet. But we’re five years in and haven’t had any leaks. It’s built very well.”
Nelson said the basement-style parlor reduced their maintenance costs. The parlor’s meters and electronics are located in the basement where they stay dry and clean.
“We’ve only had to replace maybe two units at most,” Nelson said. “The parlor requires very little maintenance and is easy for our maintenance guys to work on even when we’re milking. The basement has also been a benefit for testing milk.”
Nelson said they have no regrets when it comes to the basement.
“You do have to take steps to ensure it won’t leak,” she said. “We spent the extra money upfront for special epoxy coatings and seals, etc. When you walk into the parlor, it’s a very calm envi-ronment and a welcoming place for cows. It also has great ventilation and stays nice and cool in the summer and warm in the winter, unlike our old parlor.”
Roden said their new parlor is also much more inviting than their previous parlor.
“Our old parlor was dark and small, but in the new parlor, the work environment is top notch,” he said. “There’s good ventilation, LED lights, and everything is white and bright.”
Nelson’s favorite feature of her parlor is the camera system.
“Cameras have been invaluable to us, especially in the form of employee training,” she said.
Roden is also a fan of having cameras in the parlor. Eight cameras inside and outside are the extra eyes providing peace of mind to the Rodens.
“Cameras are a great feature to have on a farm,” Roden said. “We can use that footage to show employees if they’re making mistakes, and we can also highlight what they’re doing right.”   
Brooks Farms started out with a two-man shift – one person milked while another pushed up cows. It was a tactic they tried for nearly two years, but employee turnover was high.
“We were constantly hiring new people,” Nelson said. “So now we have two people in the parlor and one person pushing up cows.”
Brooks Farms runs a seven-day on, one-day off schedule with the day off rotating throughout the week and weekend. Employees maintain a nine-hour workday.
On the cow side, Brooks Farms continues to finetune procedures in order to get the level of milk the family envisioned. When moving 200 cows into a new barn designed for 600 animals, Nelson and her dad were convinced cows would take off production-wise.
“When we moved our cows from an outdated facility where they were almost 200% overcrowded into the new facility, we thought it was the Taj Mahal,” Nelson said. “But we actually dropped in milk, and it’s been five years of trying to figure out why.”
Stray voltage was one issue they resolved. Another was being more selective about the cows that stayed in the herd. In late 2020, the family also experimented with three-times-a-day milking.  
“It’s kind of an anomaly for a herd our size to still be milking twice a day,” Nelson said. “We tried milking three times a day simply because it was one of the boxes we hadn’t checked off in figur-ing out where the milk was.”
The goal was to see a 5-pound increase in milk per cow to pay for the extra labor, utilities and chemical expenses of adding another milking. After running the numbers at the close of a year, cows were up about 3 pounds, and Brooks Farms concluded milking three times was not the solution. The family saw burnout with employees and also found that twice-a-day milking is better for their cows.
“Cows are healthier, our somatic cell count went back down, we have better foot and leg health, and cows are just able to be cows,” Nelson said. “They’re not standing in the holding area for an extra shift each day. Instead, they can eat and lay down.”
The parlors at Roden Echo Valley Farm and Brooks Farms are working well for each farm’s indi-vidual needs and offer the capacity for growth.
“We built this parlor for the future,” Nelson said. “If we ever exceed the amount of cows that can go through it, the parlor can be turned into a double-32 parallel.”