Project delivering welfare benefits on Cumbrian farm…

NIGEL Teasdale is the third generation of his family to farm at Halefield Farm, Kirkby Thorne near Penrith.

In the heart of the Eden valley, the farm extends to around 270 acres and is home to around 100 cows with 100 acres of the land dedicated to combinable crops and a small beef enterprise. The dairy herd is a mixture of red and white Holstein Friesians, Ayrshires and MRIs and yields average around 6500 litre/ year.

"We are already seeing an improvement in cow comfort and welfare and we haven’t finished implementing all of the recommendations yet." - Nigel Teasdale

When the animal health and welfare project was first launched Nigel expressed his interest in taking part.

"When the leaflet came through the post I rang up straight away," he explains. "We have struggled with cow comfort and somatic cell counts for some time and I thought it would be really beneficial to take part in the project."

So a visit from his vet, Matt Colston, from Frame and Swift in Penrith, and his adviser, Nigel Hardie, from CREA was arranged. They had a look around the farm with Nigel and quickly identified the cow housing as a problem area for both cow comfort and milk hygiene. In addition, fertility was highlighted as an area that could be improved, via the implementation of a recording system.

"Our cow housing is in an old byre that was converted to Newton Rigg cubicles in 1976," explained Nigel. "The vet and adviser recommended that we improve the housing by upgrading the cubicle divisions and installing matresses, whilst also focusing on improvements to ventilation."

In addition, Nigel was recommended to start milk sampling to identify the pathogens causing mastitis cases and to consider parlour routines to prevent cross infection.

Nigel took this advice on board and decided to apply for grant funding for new cubicles and matresses, as well as cluster flushing in the parlour. This was approved and the cubicles were altered in time for this housing season.

"We are already seeing an improvement in cow comfort and welfare and we haven’t finished implementing all of the recommendations yet," Nigel commented. "We used to have several cows that wouldn’t lie in the beds and now we don’t seem to have that problem, and the cows are definitely more comfortable."

Overall, Nigel has been pleased that he took advantage of the advice available. He concluded: "The process worked well and has been really useful. We’ve still got some more work to do but we’ve definitely seen welfare benefits as a result."

(Report by Phil Gibson on behalf of Kite Consulting)

Animal Health and Welfare Planning is available to dairy, beef, sheep, pig and poultry producers in the North West.

More information on the Livestock Programme's Animal Health and Welfare Planning project

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