Maximising performance in the milking parlour can be one way to help control costs via improved udder health. However there are often other positive spin offs from investigating milking systems. For example, we have carried out many dynamic parlour tests over the past few years, as part of udder health investigations, and in many cases, we have helped to reduce milking times by 0.5-1.5 hours per shift.

A typical farm milking twice a day, with two people in the parlour, saving 30 minutes per milking would save approximately 730 milking hours per year. If priced at national living wage this would save £9278/year before accounting for other employee costs and costs of running the plant. As most employees do not wish to have their pay packets reduced, this extra time can often be used to carry out other tasks on farm, hence improving efficiencies and wage costs elsewhere.

Not only is this all useful from a labour point of view, the cows very much benefit too. Cows going to the milking parlour is a necessity, but keeping this time to a minimum is greatly beneficial in reducing standing times, out of pen times, with gains in other areas of cow health and production, particularly lameness.

Improving milking systems to help maximize udder health will also help to reduce unnecessary forced herd exits, costs and poor morale associated with mastitis, and yield checks linked with cell count challenges. For example, research shows that a bulk SCC increase from 100,000 to 200,000 leads to a 2.5% yield reduction.

Dynamic testing, unlike the static test, measures what is happening at teat level during milking. It enables us to assess many key areas including vacuum levels at the teat end, milk letdown, liner fit and ACR settings. The results can then be used to make informed decisions on parlour settings and routine. Milking is a risky time for cows, with open teat canals and vacuum pressures being applied to the teat potentially causing damage. Using test results to target quicker milk drops and higher peak milk flow, can lead to reduced cluster on time, and better udder health. For example, dynamic testing has allowed us to work with some three times milking systems to increase take-off settings to over 1.2 litres/min, targeting maximal teat health and condition with no impact on yields.

While carrying out dynamic testing, other areas can be examined. For example, as farms have expanded, new sheds are added and parlour location can become a challenge. Assessing how cows move around a unit can inform layout or design alterations to help farms to become more efficient. We work with farms to help achieve improvements in out of pen time, lameness, and cow cleanliness.

Overall dynamic testing can provide data for your individual parlour which alongside other milking observations, leads to a bespoke set of recommendations for each farm to help with cost control across multiple aspects of the farm business. These findings can be presented back to milking teams to help achieve efficiency and compliance.