# Questions about American dairy farms that are certified organic.



## jonbailey (May 7, 2018)

What is the minimal number of registered Holstein cows needed to maintain a profitable organic dairy?

How many gallons of milk will such cow yield daily?

If such a dairy farm has 500 head of milk cows, how many personnel are needed on any one shift to operate it? 

How many bales of hay will the herd consume daily?

How many pounds of feed will the herd consume daily? 

How much grazing pasture is needed?

How many machine milking stalls are needed?

How much holding tank capacity is needed?

How many tanker trucks will visit the farm daily to collect milk for market? 

Are German shepherds good working dogs for milk cows?


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## gottatrot (Jan 9, 2011)

jonbailey said:


> Are German shepherds good working dogs for milk cows?


I don't know the answer to most of your questions, even though I lived in an area that was mostly dairy farms for several years. However, I can tell you dogs were never used for dairy cows. The cows have routines they are accustomed to and they bring themselves in and out of the barns at the appropriate times. We used to laugh driving by and seeing them walking head to tail, all on their own in long lines to go into the barn for milking.


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## jonbailey (May 7, 2018)

gottatrot said:


> I don't know the answer to most of your questions, even though I lived in an area that was mostly dairy farms for several years. However, I can tell you dogs were never used for dairy cows. The cows have routines they are accustomed to and they bring themselves in and out of the barns at the appropriate times. We used to laugh driving by and seeing them walking head to tail, all on their own in long lines to go into the barn for milking.



I ask because I'm modeling a dairy farm as scenery for my model train layout.

There are a bunch of black and white holsteins. There is a couple large barns for milking and much open pasture for grazing. There is one scene with a farmer in a straw hat with bib overalls crossing the cows from the barnyard into the pasture across the country two-lane highway at the gates. He has a couple of German shepherds helpers. These cows may be in a pasture a mile long or more since it is in a valley of the rural Pacific Northwest mountains. The dogs may a boon to bring the cows home for milking a mile or more. There are also three milk tanker trucks and tall storage tanks. 

If not for excellent herding, shepherds make **** good farm and ranch security dogs. I don't have any Lassie collie content or border collie content for my layout. 

Please stay tuned for a video.


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## horselovinguy (Oct 1, 2013)

Dairy around the corner from me has at last count 1850 cows....
They feed round rolls....lots of them every day.
I see milk tankers coming and going at least 3x a day and several at each time.
No idea of how big the milk barn is..it is private property and fenced.
They don't use dogs to do anything with the cows, in fact I never see the farm dogs{pets} in the fields.._never!_
The cows as was told are on their own time-schedule...they come and go when needed, as needed.
I've seen 3 guys working there, not all the same gentlemen...and know there are more but exactly how many...no idea. This farm runs 24/7....
Feed is delivered to troughs by a bucket-loader...a huge one. Feed is dumped into about 10 feeders so all the cows have a chance to eat some.
Acreage...the farm by me has over 1,500 acres of_ grazing_ land that I know of...then they have other land connected I am unsure of acreage amount.
Milk barn is appropriate to size of the herd I imagine...
Cows fresh from birthing are when they produce the largest quantity...other than that "??".
:runninghorse2:...


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## QtrBel (May 31, 2012)

I'll try to dig up my info this weekend. The business my x and I owned was a composting company specifically for dairy waste. We were based on a dairy in Tx and I had all those numbers. If I can find them I'll share with you. If they are moving across a road then I can see having a couple of dogs and someone to open and close the gates, but the reality is that if at all avoidable there will be no road crossings.


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## carshon (Apr 7, 2015)

This question is a hard one to answer because dairy farming is different in different parts of the country. I live in NW IL and there are quite a few dairies here. Many have gone organic recently. I will second what others have said and can say that none of the dairies near me use dogs in any way to interact with their cows. Dairy cows do not need to be herded to come in to be milked. The cows learn what time milking time is and will voluntarily come in from pasture or lot to the barn to be milked. A conscientious farmer will never use dogs - as an upset cow does not produce as much milk. In fact a lot of dairies near me do not allow visitors during milking time for that exact reason. There are quite a few automated farms in my area - where the cows wear neck chains with tags on them and they can come into the milking parlor and be milked via an automated milking machine - this has proven to produce more milk and have less udder injuries for the cows.

As for feed - again depends on how many cows. Most will feed round bales and grain or silage to the cows - milk cows get the highest quality hay available. 5 or 6 cows will go through 1 round bale in about 10 days


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## Foxhunter (Feb 5, 2012)

As said few dairies use working dogs, the cows come in on their own. 

Majority of dairy farmers I know in the U.K. Calve within three months, and those are in Sept, Oct and November. This will boost the quantity of milk. 

Cows, in the winter, are kept inside a d their milk yield will be boosted when they are turned out on grass in the spring. 

The rest I cannot answer only to say that as a cow ages her yield will drop.


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## jaydee (May 10, 2012)

A dairy cow will produce on average, 6 gallons of milk a day.
How much they produce is relative to how many times a day they're milked and what they're fed on, as well as maturity.
A facility that's small but wanting to get a decent income feeds sileage and hay supplemented with a balanced feed of grains from cereal crops, soybeans and minerals and vitamins. In good weather they'll be outside on grass or housed indoors on a zero grazing system where the grass is cut and fed fresh to them.
They'll need around 90 to 100 pounds of food a day, the bulk of that's going to be the silage, hay and grass.
German Shepherds can make good herding dogs but the welsh collie is the most common. The important thing with a dog that's going to work dairy cattle is that its 'kind' to them - you absolutely can't have a dog that's going to get them running or one that nips at them risking injury to their udders.
My Grandmother had a German Shepherd, when my DH worked in dairy they had a welsh collie.


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## AndyTheCornbread (Feb 3, 2019)

I grew up on a dairy and cattle farm. 

We were a "B" grade dairy, so milk that goes into products containing milk but not straight drinking milk. We milked around 74 head of holsteins. We had a lot of pastures that were quite a way from the barn so we used Australian cattle dogs to herd the cows up to the barn at milking time. You have to have REALLY well trained dogs to do this who have been taught at what speed cows can be allowed to move at when they have full udders. If you move them too fast you will aggravate their udders and they will get mastitis and you will be in a world of hurt both in profits and your hands are going to get super sore from getting kicked by cows with sore udders when you go to hang the milkers on them. 

So the dog has to understand how fast cows can move, and not only be able to herd them but also slow them down if they get going too fast. It takes a lot of time and effort to get a dog trained right to move dairy cattle. 

Contrary to popular belief dairy cows don't always just go to the barn to get milked on their own. They will when they are very fresh because they get uncomfortable in the bag by milking time, but milking twice a day like we did, if they are more than about halfway through their cycle they don't always feel like moving up to the barn to get milked, they would rather sleep or eat and skip a milking. 

This is where ACDs really came in handy, they were aggressive enough to get sleepy grumpy cows on their feet and moved into the barn. We typically only used one dog at a time, more than that is too much pressure on the cows and they will move too fast. 

When I was little we did it on horse back but as I got older we got a 3-wheeler and later we used 4-wheelers. No matter how romantic it sounds, saddling a horse at 4am every morning gets old. 

So does milking 74 head, twice a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year for that matter. 

My uncle, whose farm I grew up on, took two vacations in over 40 years. Once he went to some water slides in Canada for a weekend while my other uncle milked our cows and once he went to Hawaii for a week while the same other uncle did his milking for him. 

I was in the Marine Corps at the time so I saw Hawaii but not with my family. 

Running a dairy farm is great way to have no time of your own, ever. We made a living with 74 head actively milking but we had 200 - 400 head due to calves and cows that weren't fresh or who were too fresh so they still had blood in the milk etc. as well as our meat cattle. We made it just fine, but we were never very well off and we constantly smelled like cow dung. 

I wouldn't do it again for all the money in the world. It is actually one of the big reasons I went to University after the Marine Corps. I didn't want to get stuck farming for the rest of my life.


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## jonbailey (May 7, 2018)

Fresh cow, one that just calved to revitalize milk production?


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## AndyTheCornbread (Feb 3, 2019)

jonbailey said:


> Fresh cow, one that just calved to revitalize milk production?


Yes, sorry a cow is called fresh if it has recently calved. You have to milk them into a separate container for a while due to blood in their milk so that it doesn't contaminate all the other milk in your tank. We just fed the bloody milk mixed with milk replacer to our calves.


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## jonbailey (May 7, 2018)

Blood in cow milk is a common sign of Mastitis.

Mastitis in dairy cows is caused by udder infections, usually resulting from bacteria introduced either during the milking process or from environmental contact. Examples include contamination from milking equipment, milking personnel, manure contamination or dirty stalls.

https://albertamilk.com/ask-dairy-farmer/what-causes-mastitis-in-dairy-cows/

A conscientious dairy as one that is "USDA certified organic" is likely going to operate under conditions that promote total cow health and mastitis should seldom be an issue.


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## Avna (Jul 11, 2015)

My grandparents were Wisconsin dairy farmers. @AndyTheCornbread is dead on, it is a grind like few others. They got one week of vacation a year when their neighbors would milk all their cows twice a day after he had milked his own. They would do the same for him so he and his family got a week off too. When their daughter married and moved out West (my parents), they moved too. My grandpa became a construction carpenter. They never looked back. 

What is the minimal number of registered Holstein cows needed to maintain a profitable organic dairy? 
Totally depends

How many gallons of milk will such cow yield daily?
an amazing amount

If such a dairy farm has 500 head of milk cows, how many personnel are needed on any one shift to operate it? 
Not as many as you'd think, it is highly mechanized now

How many bales of hay will the herd consume daily?
depends on the size of the bales and whether they had access to pasture

How many pounds of feed will the herd consume daily?
Depends entirely on how many cows and where they are in their lactation cycle and a lot of other factors 

How much grazing pasture is needed?
Depends on the area. In wet-summer climates it might be an acre per cow.

How many machine milking stalls are needed?
As many milk cows as you have unless you have staggered milk times

How much holding tank capacity is needed?
Depends on how big your herd is and how often the milk truck comes

How many tanker trucks will visit the farm daily to collect milk for market? 
Depends

Are German shepherds good working dogs for milk cows?
Some are. Most aren't. Most GSDs are not good herding dogs as they have been bred for other things for many generations.

I am not trying to be flip here -- your questions are far too general to be answered. If you asked something like, how many cows does the typical Vermont organic dairy milk daily, that is answerable. 

Many dairies in the west have zero grazing and the cows are fed silage year round. They also might have 2000 cows where a New England dairy might have 200.


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## SilverMaple (Jun 24, 2017)

The only organic dairy I know uses Jerseys, not Holsteins, and the ladies are out a pasture full-time, and come in on their own to be milked. Dairy cattle are not worked with dogs.


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