As much as 50% of livestock buildings may actually be holding back animal performance and increasing costs.  This could be costing the average livestock farmer a substantial amount of money in terms of increased incidence of disease and poorer animal performance.  Take for an example, a calf barn where pneumonia is a constant issue.  The substantial losses in growth rate from the infected animals, the impact on cohort animals, the subsequent milk yield losses and the direct cost of treatment are a list of the physical and financial consequences.

Many of the issues relating to buildings can be traced to a few factors including poor ventilation, insufficient feeding space and poor design of lying areas.  Understanding the basic animal requirement is critical in terms of ventilation, temperature and space requirement.  The benefits of good ventilation and its ability to reduce disease, is well known.  Understanding the critical temperature for all categories of stock is critical to ensure that a building is fit for purpose.  Many buildings old and new fail to provide basic ventilation and lack a sufficient air outlet space for the stock in the building.  Frequently one sees buildings where the side walls have been removed with no attention paid to the ridge and air has no way of leaving the building.

Lighting is an area that has been over looked in the ruminant sector compared to the pig and poultry sector where there are well known and clear benefits from the correct lighting.  Evidence shows that an increased performance for ruminants in the range of 3-4% can be achieved from providing 200 lumens of light for 18 hours a day and 6 hour of darkness.  The payback period can be as little as 4 years where cows are housed for long periods.

To discuss how you can cost effectively improve your animal performance with some building alterations, please contact William at w.waterfield@fcgagric.com or your local FCG office.