Nonstop fresh feed

MT. CALVARY, Wis. — Cows at Tower View Acres LLC never go hungry with two mixing and feeding robots continually delivering feed to each pen. Since installing the Lely Vector automatic feeding system in July 2024, the Baus family has improved efficiency in feed mixing, feed distribution and cow flow through their robotic milkers.

“Cows have fresh feed all the time,” Jason Baus said. “There’s no slug feeding anymore, which means we don’t have big groups coming up to eat at the same time. This frees up the robots, and we’re able to harvest more milk per day because it leveled out traffic flow around the barn.”

Baus farms with his wife, Diana, his parents, Ron and Mary, his sister, Stephanie, and four part-time employees. The Baus family milks 220 cows with three Lely A4 robots and farms 580 acres near Mt. Calvary.

The Baus family installed a robotic milking system in 2016 when building a 6-row freestall barn and expanding from 90 cows. An addition to the barn houses the new feeding system. The Baus family, along with Central AG Supply Services, hosted an open house March 18 to showcase their new feeding system.

Cows average 104 pounds of milk per day with 7.31 pounds of solids on 2.4 milkings. The farm averages 7,300-7,600 pounds of milk harvested per robot per day.Baus said they are seeing an increase in milk production, and he feels a bigger milk benefit is coming.

The mixing and feeding robots are all-in-one machines providing feed mixing and delivery along with feed push-up services. The Baus family’s machines, named Moober Eats and Dairy Dash, continuously push in feed and monitor feed heights. Once feed levels reach a certain threshold, the system will begin mixing a batch of feed.

At the center of the automatic feeding system is the feed kitchen, where ingredients are stored and mixing takes place by the two mixing and feeding robots. The kitchen includes five feed bunkers — two for haylage, one for corn silage, one for straw and one for cottonseed. Small bins containing additives and minerals and large outdoor bins for ground corn and minerals are also part of the kitchen.

Following a recipe for each ration, a crane grabber pulls ingredients from the feed bunkers and deposits them into the mixers. Flex augers deliver feed to the mixers from the indoor and outdoor bins. The mixer constantly blends as ingredients are added. After all ingredients are in, a post mix is done to achieve optimal concentration and blending of feed.

Once mixing is complete, the mixer heads to the barn to dispense feed. It takes 30 minutes to mix a batch and 15 minutes to feed a batch. The mixer adjusts its dispensing speed depending on the height of the feed to ensure even dispersal. The two mixers communicate with each other, and the second mixer will bring more feed to the barn if needed. If feed is required at multiple fences, the mixers will take multiple batches.

To ensure the freshest feed possible, 1-4 days’ worth of feed is stored in the bunkers, depending on the time of year.

“In the winter, the kitchen is packed full of feed, so we don’t have to open the doors as much,” Baus said.

When a bunker is getting close to empty, Baus gets an alert on his phone. The system will not mix new feed until the bunker is filled. Before, the farm had spent 3-4 hours per day loading, mixing and feeding. Now, it takes 1.5-2 hours per day to restock the kitchen with fresh feed.

Previously, the cows’ bunks were sometimes empty by 4 or 5 a.m. but the cows were not fed until 6:30 a.m. This lag created a rush on feed when a new batch was delivered. This, in turn, caused a backup at the robotic milkers. When feeding in full batches, a line of cows 8-12 deep would line up at the robots at one time. Now, lines are short, with 2-3 cows waiting. Instead of feeding a large batch of feed once a day, fresh feed is consistently arriving in front of cows in smaller batches.

The barn is broken into nine feed fences, and Baus can customize the amount of feed for each area or fence. A full batch fills the whole feed fence. In smaller sections, the system dispenses smaller amounts. Rations can be split between feed fences if those areas receive the same ration.

Their system is mixing about 25,000 pounds of feed per day for a total of 21 batches. They feed three different rations — one for milk cows, one for dry cows and one for pre-fresh cows 14 days before calving.

“There are no refusals,” Baus said. “Everything is tuned in.”

The system’s precision in mixing has also resulted in feed savings, Baus said. The automated system removes human error in measuring, keeping recipes close to 100% accurate.

“When you fill a conventional mixer, it’s easy to drop in an extra 100-200 pounds as you’re getting to the end of the corn silage and trying to feather a little into that last bucket,” Baus said. “This system is grabbing smaller bits and dialing it in more accurately on a dump. The bigger it is, the more chance of human error, whereas the automation side keeps retrying until it gets closer.”

Baus said flexibility has been the biggest benefit of the automatic feeding system as they can now better prioritize and adjust their workflow.

“As long as there is feed in the kitchen, you can fill it any time of day,” he said. “If it’s raining in the morning, we don’t have to bring feed in until later. Previously when the bunks were cleaned out by 6:30 a.m., the cows needed to get fed before doing something else. Now, they’re never out of feed because the system is always bringing out a batch.”