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A few years ago I built a new cattle house and it has turned out to be a wonderful addition to the farm.
But probably like everyone else, I went over budget and when it was finished I didn’t feel like spending more money putting electricity into the house.
So I tried to work without electricity for the initial period. It was difficult in the dark winter days and I had to do most of the work in the house during daylight – there isn’t much of that at this time of the year.
It was impossible to inseminate them in the dark
The new shed was used to house autumn-calving cows, and they had to be bred over the winter.
It was impossible to inseminate them in the dark so everything had to be done during daylight and as a result, this restricted the timing of AI.
But this in itself wasn’t the only problem.
Probably the biggest issue was the heat detection. I went into the house in the early morning and evening time and I had to use a torch to try and see if there were any cows in heat.
It was difficult and, if I’m honest, I didn’t detect many heats this way. There were definitely heats missed.
Then if I was away for the day, it meant that I had to try and feed the cattle in the dark.
And, when it came to checking for sick cattle, I quickly learned it is very difficult with torchlight.
I went for the best that I could afford
Finally, I had enough of this so I decided to get new lights into the house this winter.
I went for the best that I could afford, and put in lots of light both inside and outside.
I made sure that they were on separate switches so that I only needed to switch on enough to do the job in hand.
They come on in the evening and then go off the following morning
One other thing that I did was to put in night lights. These are lights which come on when a sensor detects that daylight has dropped below a certain level.
They come on in the evening and then go off the following morning, which means that I can check the cows at any stage (day or night) by just walking up and down the house.
If they were in the dark and you switched on lights, the stock would probably be all disturbed and it wouldn’t be easy to detect heats.
This has made heat detection a lot more straightforward.
Other change
There is one other change that I have noticed – when a cow is in heat, it is usually a strong heat.
That has made me think about something that I was taught a long time ago.
In nature, a cow will breed naturally when the days are at their longest
Cattle are a seasonal animal and before they were domesticated cows would only calve in the late spring or early summer when the days start to get longer.
In nature, a cow will breed naturally when the days are at their longest and then they will stop breeding during the winter.
I have noticed it with my autumn-calving cows. Some of them effectively shut down for the winter and will not come into heat naturally.
So the only way to get some of them to breed is to insert the likes of a CIDR to start them cycling.
Down through the years, I have found that you can reduce the occurrence of a cow not showing heat by nutrition (good silage and meal) and by restricting access to the calf, but until this year I have not been able to eliminate the issue altogether.
My autumn-calving cows now think that there are long days
However, the use of the night lights seems to have made that last little bit of difference.
My autumn-calving cows now think that there are long days (in the middle of winter) and they are on a good plane of nutrition, so they are ready to come into heat, and subsequently go in-calf.
I put the lights into the shed to make management easier and to make my life more comfortable, but it looks like I have stumbled over an unforeseen, but welcome bonus.
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