Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show in Woodstock, Ontario, presented the first opportunity for producers to see the all-new DeLaval VMS™ milking system V300 milking cows in North America, and it did not disappoint.
Cows were brought into the BriteSpan Dairy Innovation Centre from a local, conventional dairy and learned to use the VMS V300 in just a few days leading up to the show. The herd consisted of 35 cows; 33 Holsteins and two Jerseys. According to Gavin Strang, DeLaval Market Development Manager, the VMS V300 adjusted to the range in sizes flawlessly. “The cows weren’t used to robotic milking for one thing, but throwing in the noise and disturbance of the large crowds in the barn gave the cows and the robots a real test,” he says.
The VMS V300 passed with flying colors. Milk yields averaged 35 kilograms per cow per day, during milkings that lasted an average of six minutes and seven seconds. The cows passed through the robot 3.6 times per day throughout the show.
Strang says another factor that helped the cows settle in, stay calm and produce well, was the use of the new DeLaval OptiDuo™ feed pusher. “Always having fresh, remixed feed in front of the cows really kept them content, and kept traffic flowing through the pen and the robot,” Strang confirms.
DeLaval anticipates the availability of the OptiDuo for sale in North America early in 2019. The OptiDuo doesn’t just push feed; it remixes it, making it more appealing to the cows and avoiding compression – translating to higher consumption and more milk produced.
“The new milking system’s performance at the show is just scratching the surface of what we know the VMS V300 can do,” Strang says. With a ten percent higher capacity, up to 50 percent faster attachment time than earlier models, up to 99.8 percent attachment rate, up to 99 percent teat spray hit rate, real quarter milking and with a potential of up to 3,500 kilograms of milk per day, the DeLaval VMS V300 is setting an all new industry performance standard*.
Visit World Dairy Expo in Madison, WI, October 2-6, for another chance to see the VMS V300 in action.
*Data collected on test and pilot farms.
About DeLaval
DeLaval is a worldwide leader in milking equipment and solutions for dairy farmers, which make sustainable food production possible, warranting milk quality and animal health. Our solutions are used by millions of dairy farmers around the globe every day.
DeLaval was founded more than 135 years ago in Sweden, when the visionary Gustaf de Laval patented the cream separator. Today, DeLaval has 4,500 employees and operates in more than 100 markets. DeLaval, alongside Tetra Pak and Sidel, is part of the Tetra Laval Group. See more here.
