Abstract #317

# 317
Producer experience with precision dairy.
B. Biehl*1, 1Corner View Farm, Kutztown, PA.

Corner View Farm began milking a couple cows in 1915 by Ammon Biehl. It was a typical farm in Berks County, PA, with 14 cows in a tie stall arrangement. The family farmed 93 acres to support the dairy and crop sales. At that time, there was one hired employee to help with the chores. Five generations later, young Blake (age 13) and Baxter (age 11), live on the same property and walk around the same farm with their iPhones in a very different time. They can watch over the cows with IP cameras and control barn functions from their remote touch screens. All of this transformation has been witnessed by second generation, Leroy Biehl, who recently turned 92 years old. In December 2011, the Biehls began milking in their new free-flow, 3-row, 120-stall robotic milking facility, equipped with the Astrea 20.20 robot, supplied by AMS Galaxy USA. The foundation of the robot is a standard Motoman HP20 industrial robotic arm that has 6 axis for 6 degrees of freedom allowing it to prep and attach cows in a milking stall on each side of the central milking unit. The single robotic system has milked up to 125 cows at time. Brad not only watches from his smart phone, he has the ability to navigate the Saturnus 20.20 robotic milking and herd software. From anywhere, he can track activity monitoring, milking statistics, sorting sick cows, separating milk for treated cows, and managing herd records. However, it doesn’t stop there. From the touch screen of his phone, Brad can fully control, 5 fans, 2 curtains, sprinkler system, 4 fans, thermostats for floor heating, roll-up doors, and 6 sections of lighting control technology. All of the automation is also controlled by programming that keeps curtains closed when it’s raining, curtains open when the barn is warm, curtains closed when it’s too cold, lighting controlled to maximize cow traffic / production, and fans running only when needed to conserve energy. In 2015 and 2016, Corner View Farm added additional enhancements including the Hetwin automatic feed pusher, Hetwin Bedding robot, and Urban Alma Automatic Calf Feeders. Other new precision dairy include the Galaxy Heat Herd Health module that monitors activity, chewing monitoring, and cow position. These additional precision dairy monitors continue to enhance cow health.

Key Words: Corner View Farm, robotic milking

Speaker Bio
A fourth-generation dairy producer, Bradley Biehl partnered with his father, Dalton Biehl, to install the first U.S. Astrea 20.20 by AMS Galaxy USA. With a bachelor’s and master’s degree in mechanical engineering from Penn State University, Brad designed a new fully automated facility around the two-stall robotic milking system. This robot features a single robotic arm that milks cows in two side-by-side stalls Transitioning from a 60-cow tiestall operation, the farm doubled in size to 120 cows. With only adding a fraction of labor, the farm achieved a 30 percent increase in milk production.