GEA milking system upgrade shaves 2 hours off daily milking New Zealand Goat Farmers Wiebe and Piety Smitstra retrofitted their goat milking shed with a GEA low line double-up herringbone system, including automatic cup removers, milk meters and DairyPlan software. The efficiency gains have been well worth it, with the Smitstra family seeing big improvements in milking time, animal health and herd management. The Smitstras farm at Matamata, a small community in the heart of the Waikato region of New Zealand’s North Island. The farm is 130ha and home to a herd of 1,200 dairy goats. Most of the herd are Saanen goats, originally from Switzerland. Approximately 30% of the herd are replaced annually, with all replacements reared on farm. Milking goats is a family business. Wiebe and Piety have been in the industry for 25 years, raising five children in that time. The farm is currently managed by Wiebe and Piety with the help of their two sons. The goats are milked twice daily, with Wiebe managing the morning shift and the boys managing the afternoon shift. In the past they worked with an old 40-bale herringbone parlour with highline swing over clusters and pulsation. Between them, the family spent up to eight hours a day in the milking parlour – four hours in the morning and another four in the evening.
The Smitstra family Wiebe, Emma, Piety
“We milk 600 ewes in just 1 hour with this shed.“ Rhys Darby - WAIKATO 42 a-side dairy sheep Rapid Exit Swing-Over Parlour. Converting an obsolete herringbone 36 a-side shed back in June 2020, Rhys and the Darby family have added another string to their bow, with significantly less capital outlay – hoping to pay back their new install in just 3 years. Having built 2 dairy cow sheds with GEA in the past, Rhys says “GEA equipment isn’t the cheapest stuff around, but at least we know it lasts and works really well, with what we want”. Rhys enjoys the quickest and most efficient way of milking sheep, incorporating in-shed feeding and TopFlow S clusters for ultimate cluster alignment and a quick milking-out process. Each milking row is in, and then out in just 5 minutes - with it just taking 30 seconds to exit the stall, thanks to our Rapid Exit Stalling. Need breaking ground technology like Rhys? Call us for your free on-farm consult. 0800 GEA FARM
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Goat & Sheep Milk NZ - Issue 4 | December 2021
