Andrew McNamee contacted the Irish Farmers Journal with an idea he has come up with to save money on slurry scraping in the short-term. The McNamees from Calhane, Convoy, Co Donegal, are new entrants to dairying. They have cubicle sheds for their dairy cows but do not have automatic slurry scrapers.

They bought an old butterfly mower from a golf course that was for sale online at a cost of €750. The lawnmower had three cutting decks which the McNamees removed. They replaced the cutting decks with rubber from an industrial-sized conveyor to make a slurry scraper.

Andrew says the scraper is very solid and useful for scraping livestock passageways clean in the recently converted cubicle sheds. “The manoeuvrability is great too. It is really easy to turn and we are no length cleaning the passages every morning,” he explains. The scraper is welded on to the arms that once lifted the front cutter deck which means it can be automatically positioned up and down as required with a foot pedal.