A PEMBROKESHIRE dairy farm is making significant labour cost savings by adopting a robotic milking system.

The Holstein herd at Treddiog Fach, near Mathry, had been milked three times a day in a 12-unit auto tandem parlour. But staffing those milkings was a financial and physical challenge for the Evans family so they installed four Lely robots.

John Evans, who farms with his wife, Janet, sons, Ben and Carl, and daughter-in-law Sian, says this has allowed the business to reduce its monthly labour bill by around £2,500.

More than 120 farmers saw the robots in action during a Lely open day at the farm.

The robots are leased from Lely on a seven-year agreement at £188/day for the four machines. The option of the lease with all consumables and servicing included, effectively fixing milking costs for the next seven years, is what drew the Evans’s to leasing instead of purchasing the machines.

A target has been set for an 1800 litre output per machine per day, which works out at 2.6 pence per litre.

Gareth Jones, South Wales Area Manager at Lely, says on a housed robotic system cows will milk an average of three times a day.

“A night milking for a farmer with 60 cows might cost £40 which is equivalent to the daily cost of a robot, and they won’t have to do the other two milkings themselves,’’ he explains.

Mr Jones says one of the most common times for farmers to switch to robotic milking is when a parlour needs upgrading.

On an average size herd, the combined capital and construction costs could work out at around £160,000.

“Robots need very little room, just a couple of bays at the end of an existing shed, so there are significant savings to be made,’’ says Mr Jones.

Yields, he says, will increase by 10-15% for those on conventional twice-a-day milking systems because cows milk three times.

At Treddiog, cows milk an average of 3-4 times in 24 hours, although some will return up to six times - the maximum number of milkings per cow the robot is programmed to allow.

Automatic units can be successfully integrated into grazing systems with a three-way grazing management system to promote the voluntary movement of cows to the milking units at appropriate intervals.

“The frequency of milking will be lower than for that of a housed system, an average of 2.3 instead of 3, but this is still higher than what would be achieved on a conventional system.’’