Bygga om och till för dikor
To be a farmer and have suckler cows is a difficult combination especially considering the economy. Because of the increased feed costs, the margins have become tighter. The meat price from beef cattle has increased a little when this text is written (spring, 2008), but not so much that it covers the cost for feed etc.
I have a small suckler cow production on approximately 30 cows and 2 bulls plus followers as a part-time business. The herd is tied in the old dairy stable built in the late seventies. The stable are still according to the animal welfare law, so the there is no problem continuing production even if my suckler cows is a bit bigger than the dairy cows. When I have finished my studies in Agricultural and Rural management at SLU Alnarp I want to increase my herd by using existing buildings. The reason why I want to use the old, already existing, buildings is to keep down the costs. Since there is an uncertainly on the market, I believe it can be wise to do as small investment as possibly.
But I am not satisfied with having only one temporary calf pen to my 30 cows. I want to have fewer cows to each pen and I also wish to have these pens permanent. Having cows tied up is old-fashioned and since I want more cows I need more space for them as well and therefore I want to build a small stable where the cows do not need to be tied up.
I wanted to learn by seeing, so I chose to visit some suckler cow producers in south of Sweden, and went to visit them to se the benefits and disadvantage of different types of stables. By doing this visits and study the stables I hoped to get an idea of what kind of stable suits my conditions best. When I analysed the visits, I found that pretty much all the stables was basically the same and only been modified to fit the farmer better. The system that all my visited farms used was a deep bed of straw with scraped alley. I realized that this construction on a stable was low cost to build up and minimized labour force.
My idea with the barn on the farm is to widen it and to do a scrape alley and a surface, with deep bed of straw where the cattle can lay down. In connection to that surface I will build a smaller surface where the calves can eat calf feed and lay down without risks o being stepped on. In another part of the extension there will be calving pens. When I completed my building plans it appeared to me that there is place for only seven percents' followers and that is to low. But I can compensate this by letting some heifers be tied up in the old stable. When the barn is rebuilt I can have further 20 cows plus calves and 4 heifers. I can also have 3 cows in the calf pens, which make one pen for 20 cows. I consider this as a better solution than one calf pen on 30 cows, which is the situation today.