Five tips to improve housing this winter

We are lucky our animals get to spend so much of their productive years at grass. This affords them with their natural environment to grow and thrive in. We do need to house our animals at the most critical time of year though. For cows, housing is around late lactation or when they are dry/calving and for sheep we will usually lamb them indoors.

This is a very metabolically challenging time for animals when they give birth and begin lactating. We need them to start eating more and clean (placenta) quickly. There is also a natural dip in ruminant’s immune systems around calving and lambing making them more prone to picking up infections.

So getting some simple things right at housing can make all the difference.

With calves, watch stocking rates. One calf per 2m² and maximise straw bedding (1)

1. Have enough space and a bed per cow

One of the biggest limiting factors around housing on Irish farms is putting too many animals in too little space. More animals does not always mean more money in existing infrastructure. When you pack animals into a shed the risk of disease greatly increases. Cows especially will be more stressed and if you mix age groups it can be a disaster. It also puts pressure on ventilation and hygiene, further adding to the disease risks.

Overstocking is a false economy and even with sheep it can lead to more lameness and competition for feeding space and water.

I suggest measuring your shed and check the space you have and the space animals need. We must also look at feed space, particularly giving enough to animals around and after birthing.

  • Suckler cows housed in slatted houses require 3m²/cow minimum, weanlings or cattle weighing under 275kg are required to have >1.5m²/animal.
  • Sheep require 1.5m² for large ewes, winter shearing may allow this to be reduced.

    • I think we really need to work harder to give more space to animals in winter time. It is seen as a cost but if this is right long term I think it will be a saving.

    Every cow should have a cubicle bed to lie down on this winter! So your minimum aim should be one cow one cubicle.

    Make sure there is a steady supply of fresh clean water (2)

    2. Fresh clean water

    I call water the forgotten mineral because to be honest a lot of housing water allowance just doesn’t cut it. With both sheep and cattle we are feeding ruminant animals that require clean fresh water for survival and for good gut fermentation.

    Plenty of clean fresh water pays dividends. Use larger drinkers that can be cleaned easily and are at the right height for animals to drink from easily.

    I have often taken a glass of water from troughs to check if I would the water myself!

    We should not spare the straw because it is a fantastic bedding. It is warm and also clean for young animals

    3. Plenty of straw

    We should not spare the straw because it is a fantastic bedding. It is warm and also clean for young animals so it makes perfect sense. It is also cheap this year so make sure you get plenty in and top it up regularly.

    One challenge with straw is to ensure that floor gradients are correct and make sure there are no leaks overhead to add moisture to bedding.

    Although we suggest peat as a bedding option in our video i would urge farmers to consider straw first as peat is probably not a sustainable option in the future. This is because our bogs are carbon sinks and will be increasingly conserved for that purpose.

    Spaced boarding works well in inlets (4)

    4.Maximise the fresh air

    Nature is free and the best disinfectant is fresh air. It kills bugs that cause pneumonia in cattle and good ventilation also helps keep sheds dry and reduce mastitis and lameness.

    Getting fresh air right is critical during the winter, it is not about building new sheds but certainly we can look at improving existing sheds.

    Check stocking rates are appropriate, too many animals will create a big challenge no matter how good the ventilation is. Check you have adequate inlets and outlets for the animals, this must be calculated on the size of the animals and worked out and is very farm specific.

    Anyone can use your nose to smell ammonia and we can also use smoke bombs to assess airflow in sheds. Regarding calves, get down on your knees and assess fresh air at calf level.

    Run scrapers regularly to keep infections down (5)

    5. Cleanliness is a keen to godliness

    Getting hygiene right is so important at winter time because with our damp winters and silage diets we can have the perfect conditions for bugs to build up.

    For dairy cows this means working hard on keeping cubicles and under foot conditions clean. Running scrapers as often as possible is really important. Also liming and cleaning cubicles every day really pays. If cattle faeces is very loose at housing get a nutritionist to review diet. Things like short chop length, or with finished cattle too much meal causing mild acidosis.

    Also ensure feed isn’t heating in ring feeders or troughs. These should also be cleaned out regularly.

    With sheep, getting underfoot conditions right is really important to minimise lameness. Ensure no leaking water (drinkers) and floor gradients are right. All feeding equipment needs to be cleaned regularly and a good tool for winter time is a steam cleaner.

    Set up disinfectant points on farm and ensure a hot water heater is working to clean equipment.

    Get an external visitor like your vet to give your farm a once over on hygiene to see if there is any weak points. This will allow them look objectively at how clean cows are and maybe make some suggestions.