Space requirements for housed livestock

Table 1 below gives a breakdown of the Department of Agriculture guideline figures on animal lying areas in slatted sheds, slatted cubicle sheds and straw bedded areas. In the following examples I will show how to estimate the lying area required for various types of cattle. In straw bedded sheds, stocking density, chopping of straw and the type of straw used will all have an impact on the level of straw usage.

In the case of straw bedded houses for sheep add 10% in area. Minimum area, Article 4, S.I. No. 138 of 1998, laying down minimum standards for the protection of calves. Source: Dept of Agriculture

Example 1 – Cows on slats

A standard bay of a shed with a 12.5ft slat and footing at the feed area normally measures 4.8m wide and 4.2m deep. This is a combined area of just over 20 m2. According to the Department guidelines of each suckler cow requiring 2.5 to 3m2, the maximum number of cows in each pen would be seven or eight. Feed space per cow should be approximately 500mm-700mm.

Where young calves are with cows and suckling on slats, with no bedded creep area, an additional 1 to 1.75m2 should be added per calf. In a nutshell, this would mean that the capacity of the pen would be reduced to approximately five cows with their calves.

The bedded creep area required at the back of a 4.8m-wide pen would need to measure more than 3m in depth for seven calves and greater than 3.35m in depth for eight calves in order for each calf to have approximately 2m2 of lying area each.

Example 2 – Weanlings on slats

The typical slatted pen above of about 20m2 could cope with up to 10 weanlings over 275kg according to the figures, however feed space has to be taken into consideration also. The average weanling requires approximately 450mm of feed space. Taking this into account, the standard shed bay could cope with up to 10 weanlings eating at once, depending on the feed barrier design.

Straw bedding

Getting the lying space right on straw bedding can have a significant impact on performance and the straw usage. As seen in table one, a suckler cow on straw would need 4m2 with an additional 1m2 where calves run with them.