Greener Dairy Farm

Renew reuse recycle That slogan doesn t just apply to paper and plastics As Ag Reporter Sarah Gustin explains those three environmentally friendly prinicples can even be applied to your cattle s bedding andamp quot Why put down new bedding when you can just reuse what you already have At Northern Lights Dairy north of St Anthony when the cows aren t busy in the milking parlor they re spending their time on the same sand that they were laying on months ago Andrew Holle Dairy Operator andamp quot Once the cows are all out of the barn or pen the guys will take the bobcat and push it down the flum which there is a water channel that carries the manure and the sand into the reception pit In there the reception pit The large sand will fall out onto the augers and the augers will carry it up to the sand seperator and then the rest of it will travel in the strem over to a pump which will pump it up to the top and seperate it it s called the ultra system seperates the finer sand out from the manure andamp quot Sarah Gustin KX News andamp quot It takes about 30 minutes from the time that the sand leaves the barn until it is cleaned and ready to be hauled back in andamp quot Andrew Holle says using sand is spendy but this sand seperator is helping cut costs He says they use about 10 semi loads of sand each week Rather than bringing in new sand all the time they only need to bring in new sand every few months Andrew Holle Dairy Operator andamp quot In our area we are buying washed sand and it is really expensive so the payback on this mahcine penciled out only a couple years the other benefit is it doesn t end up in our lagoon for those other guys every couple years they got to go into their lagoons and dig it out andamp quot Sand comes with a hefty price tag but the returns are huge Andrew Holle Dairy Operator andamp quot Sand is inorganic meaning that bacteria and other pathogens can t grow in it like they can in straw sawdust some of the other beddings We can make the stall whatever you want Mattresses they get hard they lose their softness sand you and rake them up put new sand on top and you basically start all over with a brand new bed andamp quot Holle says healthier cattle reduced somatic cell count and better overall milk production are just a few of the pay offs And the cows would have to agree life is just better on the beach Andrew Holle Dairy Operator andamp quot They just lay down it is like laying on a beach really so you get better stall usuage when they are laying down and chewing their cud that is when they are making their milk andamp quot North of St Anthony for KX news I am Sarah Gustin andamp quot Holle says they scrape alley ways 3 times a day each time for about 4 hours That means the seperator is cleaning sand about 12 hours every day