Managing a modern barn

We present the fifth episode in the series Close to the Breeder. We visited a farm in the village of Srebrna in Podlaskie region. The breeders were interviewed by Piotr Szybinski – director of the cattle department at Agrocentrum Group.

The video was created in cooperation with Farm-M Partnerhttps://farmpartner.eu – general distributor of milking installations and AfiMilk producer of solutions for breeders https://www.afimilk.com/

Ewa and Arkadiusz Bączyk have been users of a modern free-stall barn, housing 300 dairy cows, since 2021. The breeders are supported in their daily work by their 18-year-old son-Piotr, who, despite his young age, was involved from the very beginning in the process of designing the facility and selecting the solutions used. Mr. and Mrs. Bączyk’s trust in their son and faith in the younger generation is admirable. The teenager’s voice has repeatedly been decisive. Growers are conscious parents and investors – someday it will be Peter who will run the farm.

Currently, the herd has 650 cattle, of which 340 are dairy cows with 285 in milking, says Arkadiusz Baczyk. Productivity oscillates around 10,000 liters of milk. The plan is to increase productivity while maintaining the economic parameters of the herd.

The new barn measures 96x38m. It houses two 4.2m-wide feed aisles, located against the longitudinal walls of the building. These, in turn, are 3.40m high openings with steel mesh and curtains automatically controlled by a weather station.

The central part of the barn is occupied by a herd of dairy cows. The animals are housed in comfortable cubicles for bedding – located in 6 rows. The facility is also designed with isolation rooms with bedding for problem cows.

The heart of the barn is the milking parlor. The barn houses one of the most modern milking parlors of its type and size in the country, a side-by-side 2×20 stall milking parlor installed by Farm-M Partner. It is worth mentioning that the hall is equipped with a heat recovery system for pre-cooling milk.

An indispensable part of the barn’s operation is Afimilk’s AfiFarm herd management program, which the farmers decided on from the beginning of the facility’s operation. The system collects individual information about each cow, allowing efficient management of a herd of high-yielding cows.

– We’re trying to feed the cows better and better, it’s becoming normal for a cow to have to be fed this way and not that way – we’ve got it mastered. (The base for roughage is corn silage and grass haylage with alfalfa). Herd management is a new topic. The system gives us savings in time and human labor,” stresses Arkadiusz Bączyk. On a daily basis there is no one in the barn, Nas meets in the facility until 8 am and then from 5 to 7 pm,” says the farmer.

Eve is the main user of the program – you can see at a glance that this is her hubby. No wonder, work has become simpler, and herd control is possible remotely. I have access to detailed data, analysis of trends on the farm, this allows us to know even better the needs of the cows,” admits the farm owner.

– Every morning I have a fresh dose of information about the cattle, their performance and their heat. At any time each cow is monitored, I have insemination windows visible in the program, which show me the time when a particular cow should be covered,” says the breeder. Thanks to this, reproduction and calf rearing is extremely efficient – the inter-calving period is – 368 days – which is the pride of the breeder

Raising high-yielding dairy cows requires a great deal of commitment and work. A number of people work for high production results, and modern solutions and products come to the rescue. It is worth choosing ones that are truly effective. Our common goal is to help breeders optimize their operations towards profitability and sustainability.