The Future Herd
The Future Herd is managed both to train full and part-time students and to demonstrate key dairying technologies to the wider dairy farming industry. These technologies cover a wide range of important issues facing dairy farmers at present including, production efficiency, labour efficiency, environmental impact, and animal health and welfare issues. The Future Herd of 150 Holstein/Friesian cows is managed to meet a range of production targets as outlined below:
- Milk yield 8 – 8,500 litres/cow/year
- Lifetime milk yield 35,000 litres
- Milk quality
4.30 percent Butterfat
3.50 percent Protein
Achieve all hygienic quality bonuses - Production costs 10 ppl (excluding family labour)
- Top 15 percent performance for herd fertility benchmarks
- Top 15 percent profit performance from financial benchmarking