Potential Impact of Midwest Dairy Facility Design on Cow Time Budgets

Many management decisions impact a facility’s ability to allow normal animal behavior. Decisions such as stocking density, feed space available, resting space and stall dimensions or milking routine impact the dairy facilities. Prudent facility design makes every effort to enable cows to live a normal life based on current research and best design practices. Facilities have a 20- to 40-year life span and best design practices change. However, animal welfare maybe compromised by management and financial decisions in spite of utilizing best design guidelines. The facility occupancy rate index helps identify potential areas of concern prior to making a change in management or investment in facilities. The impact of 2-row vs 3-row, stocking density, milking frequency, time away from a pen are examples of management decisions which can be evaluated prior to making an actual change. The facility occupancy rate is the summation of the free stall occupancy rate and the feedline occupancy rate indexes. Current recommendations for cow time budget can be utilized to determine the potential impact of a facility and management decisions. Dairy facility design will adapt to utilize best design practices merging the overall demands of efficiency, environment and animal welfare. The impact of automated milking systems on potential facility design will explored using the facility occupancy rate index. New and expanded knowledge through sound research will be necessary to form the basics of future “best design practices”.