MONROE - What used to take hours now takes half the time.
The back-breaking procedure of bending down to milk a cow is now done relatively easily as farmers stand up and put the milking equipment on a cow that's on a platform about 5 feet high.
Brugger Family Dairy made vast improvements to its operations last year.
Brugger Farms is owned and operated by Dave and Brian Brugger and their families.
For the Bruggers, the choice was either to make changes to their farm or go out of business, Dave said. The old facilities were 42 years old and something had to be done, he added.
What they did was make changes to make working the farm more efficient, but once that happened, they increased the size of their herd, Brian joked.
The project to become more modern began in October 2006 and was completed in July 2007.
Improvements included a milking parlor, milk room, holding area for the cows as they wait to be milked, utility room and a manure-handling system.
They can milk 400 cows in four hours, Dave said. That's much faster than before, when it would take more than an hour to milk 45 cows.
Changes also were made to the barn where the cows are housed unless they're being milked.
The free stall dairy farm is 472 feet long and 104 feet wide with four rows for the 500 cows they own.
The barns are cleaned by use of a skid loader that pushes everything down a drain to a conveyor belt that carries the manure to the manure-handling system.
The cows are fed by driving through the barn and dumping feed in front of the stalls. It take a lot less time than to scoop out each cow's food by hand with a wheel barrow.
Brian explained the temperature inside the barn is controlled by a thermostat. When it gets warm inside the barn, the 22 fans turn on until the temperature drops and then they turn off.
The lights in the barn are on timers, as well, Dave added. They are on until 11 p.m. at night and then shut off until 4 a.m. That is to give the cows time to eat and sleep.
Brugger Farms is one of the six farms featured in the Green County Area Dairy Modernization Tours, scheduled from 10:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 28.
The back-breaking procedure of bending down to milk a cow is now done relatively easily as farmers stand up and put the milking equipment on a cow that's on a platform about 5 feet high.
Brugger Family Dairy made vast improvements to its operations last year.
Brugger Farms is owned and operated by Dave and Brian Brugger and their families.
For the Bruggers, the choice was either to make changes to their farm or go out of business, Dave said. The old facilities were 42 years old and something had to be done, he added.
What they did was make changes to make working the farm more efficient, but once that happened, they increased the size of their herd, Brian joked.
The project to become more modern began in October 2006 and was completed in July 2007.
Improvements included a milking parlor, milk room, holding area for the cows as they wait to be milked, utility room and a manure-handling system.
They can milk 400 cows in four hours, Dave said. That's much faster than before, when it would take more than an hour to milk 45 cows.
Changes also were made to the barn where the cows are housed unless they're being milked.
The free stall dairy farm is 472 feet long and 104 feet wide with four rows for the 500 cows they own.
The barns are cleaned by use of a skid loader that pushes everything down a drain to a conveyor belt that carries the manure to the manure-handling system.
The cows are fed by driving through the barn and dumping feed in front of the stalls. It take a lot less time than to scoop out each cow's food by hand with a wheel barrow.
Brian explained the temperature inside the barn is controlled by a thermostat. When it gets warm inside the barn, the 22 fans turn on until the temperature drops and then they turn off.
The lights in the barn are on timers, as well, Dave added. They are on until 11 p.m. at night and then shut off until 4 a.m. That is to give the cows time to eat and sleep.
Brugger Farms is one of the six farms featured in the Green County Area Dairy Modernization Tours, scheduled from 10:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 28.