What started as an idea for three brothers to combine their dairy herds and build a new facility, has led to one of the most automated precision dairies in the country, right here in northern Indiana, with robotic milking, cow monitoring, sand bedded flush system, flexible stalls and the second bedding robot to be installed in the U.S., the first in the nation to robotically bed with sand.
On Nov. 4, Micah, Japheth and Clement Martin, with their wives Laura, Jillian and Charity, hosted an open house at their state-of-the-art Milky Way Dairy and new dealership MJC Precision Solutions near New Paris.
An estimated 800 people attended the open house, judging by the number of meals and ice cream consumed during the four-hour event that attracted dairy farm families from Indiana, as well as Michigan, Ohio, Illinois, and as far west as Iowa.
The Martin brothers chose technology from a Pennsylvania-based company that makes dealer-service-level training and support available to dairy farmers who want to maintain their own equipment.
Designed for 300 cows, the facility became operational 13 months ago. Currently, 250 cows are milking voluntarily 2.7 times per day, producing 84.5 pounds per cow per day with an average SCC (somatic cell count) of 185,000.
"There were too many of us at home on Mom and Dad's farm," said Micah of the 250-cow dairy his parents and younger siblings operate. "We rented an old setup with our cows while looking into what we wanted to build."
Partway through the process, they met AMS-Galaxy-USA president Brad Biehl.
In 2015, the brothers traveled to the company's technical center in Kutztown, Pa. for training.
"There weren't any dealerships for this company in our area, but once we did the training, we knew we could do the maintenance ourselves," said Micah, adding that this was also attractive from a cost of ownership standpoint.
Biehl, a fourth generation Pennsylvania dairy farmer with an engineer's background, gave the Martin brothers the confidence to "be our own dealer," as they described it. That was attractive, and they began to realize that with the three of them operating an automated dairy together, they were in a position to extend this relationship by opening a dealership here for other dairy producers who want local service and support.
"We liked that this is a small company and if you have a problem, you can go right to the owner," Micah observed. "We also liked that we have shared values. Because we are all dairy farmers, including the owner of the Galaxy company, we can relate to each other on that level."
Japheth and Clement agree. They found that the classes prepared them for more than just repairing and maintaining a robot.
"We talked about cows and what it takes to be successful in managing a robotic facility," Clement related.
Biehl is quick to point out that working with the Martins was more like "nurturing a process. We want to give people information and we are also looking for compatible relationships with dairy producers utilizing precision technologies."
The brothers admit they were a little apprehensive at first, but after over a year in operation, said Micah, "we have not had an issue that could not be solved over the phone."
With today's technologies of facetime and smart phones, anyone at the technical services center in Pennsylvania can be "the genius behind the farmer's hands," Biehl explained.
After training and working with the technology, the brothers saw "the opportunity to not only keep up on our own equipment, but that we could also be of service to our neighbors," Clement added.
While transitions to robotic management take time for the dairyman and the cows, the brothers say that every three months, they see their own management abilities increase and the cows respond.
"A year into this, we are seeing how robotic dairying is supposed to work," Micah confirmed, explaining that as updates are made, they are able to promptly take advantage of them. "We are seeing faster milking and more milk, and as the technology improves, we have access to it."
The Martins chose a 4-row freestall barn because that is what their father built eight years ago, and they liked that type of setup. AMS-Galaxy-UsA helped them with the design for incorporating the robotic milking and bedding.
"We love how the cow flow works," Micah noted. "The one-way gates are set up so that one guy can take care of the fetch cows with one pass without having to open and shut gates."
The facility is set up with stalls that are 17' head-to-head and 45" wide. The bedding robot travels overhead and conveys sand from either side to do each set of head-to-head stalls in one pass.
This removes the need for stall-grooming. It adds sand to the fronts of the stalls multiple times throughout the day, and the cows work it back through the beds naturally. With flexible comfort stalls, the stall-widths are reduced compared with rigid stalls and this helps manure stay out of the stalls when cows exit. The flexible neck rail also contributes to cow comfort, lifting up as cows lunge to stand up.
"The biggest thing for keeping manure out of the back of the stalls is keeping sand in the front," Japheth explained. "We do make a round every morning and evening to see if we need to scrape any stalls."
To accommodate the sand bedding instead of shavings, the Martins worked with a local welding shop, Southwest Welding in Wakarusa, to design a hopper for sand in the robot filling station.
"He would make adjustments to the hopper and the conveyor, and then we would try them out," Micah reflected. "He had an idea of how it should be, and we perfected that idea by trying his designs in the barn."
The freestall barn is equipped with a flush system and gravity flow sand lane to non-mechanically separate the sand from the flush-water for the Martins to scoop, pile for drying, and re-use. The stalls are deep-bedded, and the bedding robot makes sure they stay that way.
"The robot is programmed to run three times a day on the inside aisles because they get used a little more often, and two times a day on the outside aisles," he added. "This has worked well to keep the stalls full of sand without grooming."
The brothers say they work well together managing their combined dairy. While Japheth does all the feeding every day, they are each involved in all aspects of the business.
The barn has three robot rooms. Having selected a two-box robot means that each robotic arm can milk up to 120 cows. Two of the robot rooms have one robot with two boxes and the third room has a robot with a single box to keep their herd size to 300 cows.
With a larger combined herd now, the Martins appreciate the data they get from the robots. The monitoring system uses leg bands and gives individual and group reports. It monitors activity, eating, and they know how much time the cows spend laying down. The dashboard system is easy to use giving the information they need at both the herd-level and individually.
The barn includes a main floor office and utility area as well as a second-floor office, with a catwalk above the cows providing a great view of everything happening below.
The brothers have seen their milk production improve when compared to the much older parlor and freestall setup. They once had an outdoor feeding area, but now everything is under roof now, including a maternity area. Dry cows are currently kept at the old barn a mile away, and moved to the robot barn pre-calving.
"What's nice about automation is that we can spend a lot of time out here or a little. If we need to be done in 30 minutes, we can. Without automation, that would be impossible," Micah said. "We can't do that every day, and the next day we may be in here a little longer, but we have the flexibility to do our cow management instead of being tied to a milking schedule."