Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to Dairy Intelligent, a podcast by VESR Techs.
Speaker: Together we will meet dairy industry intellects and passionate dairy producers to discuss all things cows and connected technologies.
Speaker: Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of VESR Techs' podcast, Dairy Intelligent.
Speaker: I'm Annie, your host, and today I'm joined by Dr. Mike Wolfe, consulting veterinarian for VESR Techs.
Speaker: So before we dive into today's topic and some of our questions, Dr. Wolfe, let's start off by having you introduce yourself and giving us some of your background.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: Thanks, Annie.
Speaker: Dr. Mike Wolfe, I'm a dairy practitioner for the last 43, going on 44, I guess now, and here in West Central Wisconsin.
Speaker: And I always had an interest in animal environments, particularly started out with calves.
Speaker: And then as we went into the more
Speaker: Modern ways of ventilating barns increased my interest in that, especially one of my dairy clients built a eight row cross vent barn.
Speaker: It's like, well, is this really a good idea to buy these fans and run them and maintain them?
Speaker: And how does this all work out for the cows?
Speaker: And so I bought loggers and compared that to the data we were getting compared to the old six row naturally ventilated barn.
Speaker: And gee, it turned out that this barn was doing better in terms of production.
Speaker: And through the winter months and even in the summer, the way it was set up and they actually had more pneumonias come from the old barn because there the ventilation system actually sacrificed manure management in the cold part of the winter for animal health.
Speaker: And so that's where the cows kind of lost their bit that the air quality wasn't as good because the Ridge Road was designed to freeze shut.
Speaker: And so we'd stop the ventilation and we'd be able to manage the manure.
Speaker: So, but in that, being able to see how the animals were in the new cross vent and looking at the production, reproduction, overall health and wellbeing, it was looking like this was really a pretty decent idea.
Speaker: And with the owners of originally VES at that time, we would be discussing things and they found out I had an interest in this and they see I put data loggers in
Speaker: whatnot.
Speaker: And, uh, so they were learning how to speak cow and, uh, metrics and language of the dairy industry.
Speaker: And, and I was learning fluid dynamics and ventilation design, uh, from the, uh, component aspect.
Speaker: And so it was a good, uh, uh, interspersion of disciplines and move forward from there.
Speaker: And we've, uh, actually did some things that have led to, uh, impacts on the whole industry on how we, uh, ventilate cows, uh,
Speaker: and target was having worked in these barns.
Speaker: It's like, uh, air doesn't always go and work the way you think it is in your barn.
Speaker: And so the challenge was how do we do better to make sure every cow, regardless of her social status in the, in the barn actually has a great place, uh, under any conditions that are going on, uh, spending a range of, of climate extremes.
Speaker: And so that's where we went forward.
Speaker: And, uh,
Speaker: and did some things that, like I say, actually had some impact on the industry on how things are approached today.
Speaker: Now going on, it's just like 13, going on 14 years later.
Speaker: So that's kind of my heritage has evolved with, with actually getting involved with dairy ventilation projects all over the world in cow comfort in several countries internationally.
Speaker: as well as here domestically in the United States.
Speaker: So had a lot of exposure to different cultures, different climate conditions, and the challenges that each one of those present.
Speaker: And to come up with recommendations and solutions that are both cost effective as well as also quite effective in our animal centered environment to make sure that we're taking care of these animals the best we can, and also that
Speaker: it makes the dairy more profitable too.
Speaker: So all those things have to click together to make this all work.
Speaker: So that's kind of where I come from and what's really motivated me to be involved as much as I have been over this period.
Speaker: And I've really enjoyed those challenges.
Speaker: And as a veterinarian, you're trained to go out and help cure or fix that one cow.
Speaker: And as I told the young vet that joined us,
Speaker: for the last seven years when he first started out of school that this is a way of having an impact on thousands of cows so that they don't become a broken cow.
Speaker: So again, that's part of the motivating factor here for myself and as a company in general where we're trying to go to and strive for that.
Speaker: So that's kind of that in a nutshell there, Annie.
Speaker: Wonderful.
Speaker: Well, welcome and thank you so much for being on the podcast.
Speaker: So to dive into today's topic, in many parts of the world, the warmer months are long gone.
Speaker: off-season ventilation for your herd is just as crucial in the warmer months in terms of cow health and productivity.
Speaker: And Dr. Wolf is joining us for the conversation today to walk us through the topic.
Speaker: So my first question is, what temperatures or weather elements do you consider off-season in terms of ventilation strategies?
Speaker: Well, we take a look at the cow herself when we have the
Speaker: in the spectrums that generally we get up into the mid 60s, again, this is in Fahrenheit, so I apologize for not having that conversion right at the tip of my fingers, but in that 65, things can start to have an effect on cows.
Speaker: And generally we consider heat stress to start when it's above like 68 on the THI chart.
Speaker: And so that's on that end.
Speaker: On the bottom end, the cow herself, she's able to tolerate temperatures where she's not using excess
Speaker: body condition to maintain herself until she gets to that 20 degrees or less.
Speaker: And so she's quite capable in that, that range of the fish should go set the thermostat in your barn.
Speaker: She would like to probably set it at 45 degrees Fahrenheit would be her optimal conditions.
Speaker: Now that may seem a little cool for us as humans working in that environment, but that's where she'd really be quite comfortable.
Speaker: But between those two ranges of that might of that 20, um,
Speaker: Fahrenheit up to say 68, she's not expending excessive energy for her maintenance as opposed to directing that toward her immune system for milk production, reproduction, and overall condition of her body.
Speaker: So when we get below those temperatures, then that cow's going to start pulling those resources in order to maintain her thermal homeostasis.
Speaker: within that normal body temperature of that 102.2 target.
Speaker: So any of those are the environmental conditions.
Speaker: And generally within our barns, because the cows themselves are generating quite a bit of BTUs themselves, they're putting off somewhere around like a 1,500-watt hairdryer adding into that barn so that...
Speaker: they are actually warming that barn.
Speaker: And when we do things to help control how fast that heat is leaving the building in terms of ventilation rates, um, we can keep things from freezing up.
Speaker: And we've discovered that using some ventilation, especially recirculating fans, even in the winter time in a power ventilated barn brings that warmer, drier air that rises up above in the building rather than letting that escape or go out of the building to bring that back down to the cow level has a huge impact on maintaining, um,
Speaker: alleyways and helps dry bedding and creates a better environment for the cow along with a strategy of exchanging that air by using some sort of minimal exhaust strategy with a properly balanced inlet.
Speaker: And so those are the kind of the ranges that we're looking for, especially in states that are in this northern tier, going from, say, from Idaho through the Dakotas, Wisconsin, Minnesota,
Speaker: even into New York and sort of states here to the east.
Speaker: So that's one of our challenges, that bottom end, that we get somewhat the worst of both worlds in terms of extremes on both the bottom and top end, and we have to accommodate that in our designs.
Speaker: So when you're walking into the freestyle barn in the colder months, what are some telltale signs that ventilation may be an issue?
Speaker: One of the first things I'll do is actually look up and look at the roof and see...
Speaker: If there's signs of mold or that there's, you can see tracks on the purlins, which helps support the roof of where there's been condensation and dripping.
Speaker: That's because moisture not being evacuated properly, as well as not having insulation to break that cold roof to the inside of the barn interface.
Speaker: And so that's what causes the condensation and the dripping.
Speaker: And that makes it uncomfortable for the cows to have a little light sprinkle coming onto them when they're
Speaker: lying in their beds.
Speaker: And also it will lead to the deterioration of roof elements.
Speaker: If they're steel, it's going to lead to more rust eventually and decay of that roof, as well as wood components and the metal fasteners that hold things together over time will cause those to fail if we're not keeping that environment dry.
Speaker: So from both the standpoint of what we do for the cow, there is some things that need to be done to extend the
Speaker: the lifespan of the building that you put a huge capital investment in to make sure that we're maintaining its health as well in our overall strategy.
Speaker: So you just touched on ventilating free stall barns in the wintertime, but what about parlors?
Speaker: What do you need to keep in mind there in the off season?
Speaker: And what tells you if there may be some ventilation issues going on?
Speaker: Yeah, similarly, when we come to our parlor and holding pens, the challenge there is both when it's colder, as far as the environment, the people working inside the parlor, you know, we have to be aware of their comfort.
Speaker: And many of our employees that are doing the milking actually come from a more warmer climate that are not quite as acclimated as perhaps as others are with a little more body finish, if you want to call it that, to keep ourselves warm.
Speaker: And so that can always be a challenge in terms of their comfort.
Speaker: And then the other is the moisture that builds up in your parlor.
Speaker: So when I walk into a parlor, I look up at the ceiling and the walls and see is there a degree of condensation that you can physically see as well, just like in the barns.
Speaker: Do I see molds growing on those surfaces?
Speaker: When those cows are coming through there, there's dander that's coming off the animals.
Speaker: There's greases and things like that.
Speaker: elements that bacteria and mold can grow on.
Speaker: And so when you see that, when you have a moist environment, that means that this parlor is not being properly ventilated, particularly in the cooler and colder months of the year.
Speaker: So there's that balance of how do we bring some heat into that parlor and yet still maintain some fresh air in there and then moving that out into the holding pen.
Speaker: So if we talk generally, we're looking to bring heat off the utility room
Speaker: that will, uh, where we have compressors and, and motors and things like that in there that are, uh, creating heat that we can capture that heat and force that into the parlor and then supplement that, which in most cases, the best way to do that was an infrared sort of heat, a source that will be over the work areas for the, the, whether it's a rotary, just in the different workstations or in the parallel type parlors, you know, down the, where the pit and, uh,
Speaker: And so we help maintain some comfortability for the humans that are in there, also help dry that air by having some minimal turnover in there, you know, and that for air changes an hour.
Speaker: And then when we look at the holding pan, that's a different cat there because you have these cows concentrated together and during the times that it's occupied that we may be creating many heat stress in there.
Speaker: If those cows are in there long enough, tight together without proper ventilation, that
Speaker: It may be comfortable for us, but for those cows, they can actually experience some heat stress during that time if it's too long in that holding pen tightly together compared to the free stall where they came from.
Speaker: A cow in the holding pen has six times more heat being produced per square foot of occupancy compared to the barn, and also when they're tight together,
Speaker: the same as in the summer heat, that those cows are less surface area for them to actually get rid of their heat.
Speaker: So under certain conditions, and it may be more in the transition spring and fall where you don't think they really need to run those fans in that holding pen, that they should be on.
Speaker: And so that should have an independent thermostat that actually will activate your ventilation exhaust fans or the pressurizing fans and the recirculating fans over their cows that it's totally independent
Speaker: of manual control because again, humans will tend to feel things are cooler than what those cows are actually experiencing in the holding pen.
Speaker: Thank you so much.
Speaker: So we just talked about off-season ventilation for lactating cows, but I'd like to dive a little bit into calf barn ventilation, which can often be very tricky.
Speaker: So what do you recommend for a simple and maybe even inexpensive additions to have a large impact in off-season ventilation?
Speaker: I just recently heard a gentleman, a dairyman actually from Canada came to visit several different approaches that are in this west central Wisconsin area.
Speaker: And using the tube ventilation is a very common recommendation here.
Speaker: And they do have their place under certain conditions, but it's essential that they are designed properly, installed properly, and they should be evaluated to make sure that the finished product is working correctly.
Speaker: Because if any of those factors are out of balance, you won't effectively distribute that air over your calves properly.
Speaker: And that gets into some of the design specifics that we're not going to go into here.
Speaker: But it is a way of bringing fresh air into the building.
Speaker: The downside is just it's a one, whether you're going to set it for four air changes an hour or eight, whatever your choice is, that's what it's going to be.
Speaker: And the other challenge is that we have to start thinking not in terms of ventilating the barn, we have to look in terms of how well are we ventilating the calf.
Speaker: So I really focus on what's going on at that six inches or less where that calves nose is over say close to 70% of the day.
Speaker: He's lying down with his nose either that far above the bedding or his chin right on the bedding itself.
Speaker: So when we walk through a calf barn,
Speaker: and maybe in the alleyways and say, gee, the air is just fine here.
Speaker: You need to get down on your hands and knees and, uh, get your nose down where the calves nose goes, as I call it.
Speaker: And, uh, experience what is that calf really feeling down there?
Speaker: Cause if we're not moving air at that calf level, we're not really ventilating that calf.
Speaker: Relying a lot on his thermal buoyancy for heat to rise and for that cool air to come in underneath.
Speaker: And if it's not there, um,
Speaker: these little calves are like maybe a 30 to 50 watt light bulb, so they don't drive a lot of thermal buoyancy.
Speaker: And that's where foisting some air that we know is happening at the bedding, it makes a huge impact on the quality of air for ammonia and bacterial counts that are going to occur where that calves environment is.
Speaker: So that's one of our huge driving forces.
Speaker: And I like to see velocities and you need to use a hot wire anemometer to do this.
Speaker: because your vein type antimonitors that we'll use in a dairy facility cannot really detect accurately air speeds or flows below one mile an hour.
Speaker: So that's where you need that sort of equipment being used by the people that are helping you with your ventilation strategies.
Speaker: And so again, the key is that we need to get fresh air into the building, whether we're bringing it in through, s ay, a tube system, but we also have a lot of systems where we're using
Speaker: Negative pressure barns with just exhaust fans, counterbalance inlets either from the ceiling or sidewalls to distribute air evenly so we don't have really cold areas.
Speaker: If you just have a curtain inlet in a short area, that concentrates all that cold in one area.
Speaker: So if we can spread that out over the area of the animal, then we have a better opportunity to bring fresh air to each one of the animals.
Speaker: And the other element that we're adding into these barns that
Speaker: it's had a huge impact is just simple, say 60 inch, uh, ceiling fans that are meant for agricultural use.
Speaker: If they're properly sealed, demand sand up to the moisture conditions and have them placed somewhere in that 12 to 15 feet apart, either over cubicles or bedded packs.
Speaker: So we're making sure that we're bringing some of that fresher and even warmer air in that barn down to the calf level.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: to make sure we're ventilating.
Speaker: And then we can create a strategy along with some exhaust fans with where it becomes a year round system.
Speaker: And we're not relying on the fickles of mother nature as to which direction she's blowing from that day, how hard she's blowing and which direction she's blowing from and how much rain or snow by being involved with that.
Speaker: And so we kind of eliminate the need to be operating curtains so that we close up the barn
Speaker: And we actually power ventilate it through the various stages from the extreme of winter and even the heat of the summer.
Speaker: So again, we want on the bottom end somewhere in that 30 to 60 feet per minute at the bedding level.
Speaker: And on the upper end during the summer, once we get above temperatures into the mid 60s to 70s, then we can be actually running airspeeds off those ceiling fans or maybe some other type of recirculating fan of over...
Speaker: 300 feet per minute, which is somewhere in that one and a half meter per second in roughly about three miles an hour.
Speaker: And so that both helps to cool that calf, which is a lesser priority, but disturbing the bedding.
Speaker: The flies don't like to be around that higher airflow.
Speaker: It helps dry and it drives that ammonia out of that animal's environment so we can properly evacuate it by an exhaust fan.
Speaker: And if you really start looking at the cost of investment to properly ventilate a barn versus taking out of some of those wild cards, back to those points I made about mother nature, and it's not that terribly expensive of an investment and you're amortizing this over every calf that's gonna come through that facility to get them off to a really great start, reduce that respiratory disease,
Speaker: and make them much more successful growth of a heifer and becoming pregnant and getting into that herd, you know, in that 24 month target, which helps reduce the raising costs.
Speaker: And it helps if you're not losing calves of having to raise extra or buy extra animals because you're losing animals that should have been in the pipeline, you know, for your dairy's needs.
Speaker: Oh, absolutely.
Speaker: And those calves are the future of your herd.
Speaker: So you need to make sure you're taking care of them, having them in the best possible environment year round.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: So the off season is a great time to perform routine fan maintenance.
Speaker: What is the effect of dirt and dust on the fans?
Speaker: And what is your recommendation for maintenance in terms of when to perform and how often to perform that?
Speaker: Well, it probably takes a minimum of twice a year on any fan, regardless whether you're in a
Speaker: an adult or a calf barn situation, there's always gonna be some dust depending on humidity as to how much this accumulates onto the louvers and on the intake of your exhaust fans.
Speaker: And that buildup on those louvers, one of the things I like to show dairymen as I walk through a barn and see that things are in need is just take one set of those louvers and just clean them all off with a dry hand
Speaker: and compare one set to the other and say, this is how much difference that makes to have that dirt off of that weight on those louvers on the shutters has a huge impact on how much air that fan.
Speaker: I was just in the dairy yesterday with this Canadian tour and there were fans that were running, but if you get up and look at the, how open the shutter was, you're basically turning the blade and not really ventilating the barn.
Speaker: And so that's always a challenge.
Speaker: And so that idea of at least twice a year, you know, after the summer season, before you go into the winter to clean those fans and, uh, but it can have, it comes from the poultry industry.
Speaker: You know, they talk anywhere from 25 to even 40% loss on CFM.
Speaker: And if we have fans that are run on variable speed drives, as they slow down their, uh, performance drops off dramatically.
Speaker: If those shutters are heavy,
Speaker: and can't automatically open because of that dirt accumulation.
Speaker: So one of the solutions that's coming into the market is having roll-up shutters so that the fan is running, the shutter opens up like a roll-up door.
Speaker: And then if that fan needs to shut down because it's maybe in the transition time when it's maybe coming on or off, depending on the day, time of day, that it'll automatically close back down.
Speaker: And that's going to have a huge impact on
Speaker: having to clean shutters on your barns by that sort of shutter intake sort of strategy.
Speaker: And it also, if that shutter's not on a fan, and that's generally recommended if you have fans that are above that eight foot level where people would satisfy OSHA standards, you don't need a safety guard on them if they're above that eight foot level.
Speaker: And that actually increases the performance of that fan
Speaker: even out of a test chamber, close to 10% by not having even a clean shutter on that fan.
Speaker: So that's one of the things that's coming.
Speaker: We talk about, you know, things we can do to make these barns more green.
Speaker: And yeah, we're using power to power ventilate these cows, but on a per animal basis, it's amortized over a lot more animals, but also in terms of if we're going to use this electricity and power, we need to make sure we're using it
Speaker: effectively and efficiently.
Speaker: And so that gets into the idea that you need to clean these elements.
Speaker: So we're not wasting electricity.
Speaker: If you want to look at that way, um, that's not really being effective.
Speaker: And the same applies for ventilation fans that are over the cows, you know, out in the, the, in the free stalls or your bedded pack, those fans have to be cleaned also.
Speaker: Uh, again, just because the blades going around doesn't mean you're getting adequate flow off of those, off of those, um,
Speaker: fans, that investment you're making to actually do the job you intended to do.
Speaker: Wow, that's a huge impact.
Speaker: And I think maintenance is something that often gets neglected, but as you just pointed out, it can have a huge impact on how your cows are actually being cooled.
Speaker: And the bedding type in the barn will have a huge impact on that too, where if you have manure solids and those type of kind of fluffier, drier beddings that can get
Speaker: you know, stirred up into the air flow, that increases that likelihood that you may have to clean those fans more often.
Speaker: I have a dairyman that we've worked with out in the Dakotas that after this fire situation down in Texas this past year, he bought a retired municipal fire truck to have on hand, ready to go in case he has a fire on his rather large tunnel ventilated barn.
Speaker: But he found that with the one element on that fire truck, because it has a way of like controlling grass fires or laying down a water blanket to make like a fire break, that he could use that to wash the walls of his polycarbonate and his fan wall.
Speaker: And he can go up like, I think it's like 15 feet on that fan wall with that thing to wash his fans.
Speaker: And he says, now I do it every couple, three weeks.
Speaker: He'll wash his fans.
Speaker: and hasn't had any trouble with the motors that he has on that particular fan setup.
Speaker: And so he's doing it because it's easy to do.
Speaker: And so it's getting done.
Speaker: And then he uses just the hose element to take care of the part that he can't reach.
Speaker: So to me, it was like he's making sure that his fire truck is ready to go because it's being used regularly.
Speaker: And he's found another purpose for it that actually will help the rest of his operation.
Speaker: So I found that kind of interesting.
Speaker: For sure.
Speaker: How creative, but effective.
Speaker: And if you have it, might as well have it be multi-purpose.
Speaker: So if you're looking to build a barn in temperate climate, what are the top three things to keep in mind for year-round ventilation best practices?
Speaker: Well, regardless of what climate it's in, we always start with getting fresh air into the building.
Speaker: And the second is to get it to the animal level.
Speaker: So we want to focus on that fresh air that's coming in has to get to the animal level
Speaker: to actually do any good.
Speaker: So there's a difference between ventilating a barn and ventilating the animal.
Speaker: And we've learned over time that just powering a lot of fans on the end wall, because that's how many fans fit, is not really a really efficient or effective strategy because air is always going to follow the path of least resistance.
Speaker: It's going to go down the scrape alleys, the feed lanes, and overhead in the barn.
Speaker: And what's really going on at the cow level herself, especially when she's
Speaker: where we want her laying over 50% of her day, either in that bedded pack or in the cubicle free stall, it's not happening for her.
Speaker: And so the strategy going back years that we really focus on is not putting all this horsepower on the end of the barn, put enough there to create the environment that we need in the barn for air exchange, but let's bring some of that in and direct that toward
Speaker: fans that will direct that airflow at the cow level combined with the exhaust.
Speaker: So we have the fresh air come in, get it to the animal level, and then get that exhausted out of the building at the appropriate level that's needed for the season that we're in.
Speaker: And so that's, and then you can add the cooling parts of that, whether it's soakers at the feed lanes or high pressure fog in the climates that allow for that sort of cooling strategy.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: Well, we're now at the end of our conversation, but before we wrap up, I would like to know, Dr. Wolf, what an animal-centered environment means to you.
Speaker: What's that phrase?
Speaker: Well, some of it is kind of all-encompassing of what we just covered in the last 25, 30 minutes or so here with this conversation, that this is always all about the cow and whether we start with the foundation of proper stalls, cow comfort,
Speaker: proper dimensions, all that.
Speaker: So she's got a, an appealing place to go.
Speaker: She doesn't have to think real hard about, do I really want to lay down because it's going to be hard for me to get up and that she's not going to cause any sort of harm to herself as she's interacting with those elements.
Speaker: And, uh, so that's, that's key there with cow comfort.
Speaker: And then we go to the, the idea that we have to make it.
Speaker: So, uh, this idea that, that people think of, um, the pasture situation that, uh,
Speaker: how appealing that is, the cows out there grazing on the grass, that that's what she was supposed to do.
Speaker: But many areas around the world are finding that we need to bring these cows in and control the environment better for these cows and provide many of the elements that the pasture environment was providing for her by having proper footing, using rubber and things like that, proper lighting, the use of the long day lighting in these barns.
Speaker: And again, the idea of bringing fresh air, getting it to where she lives, six feet and less.
Speaker: That's where we want to focus of getting that.
Speaker: And then remove that heat and humidity during those times and the noxious gases that are in, whether it's a calf or the cow's environment, and get it out of the barn in a controlled manner rather than relying on the fickleness of mother nature.
Speaker: And these tenets can be applied whether you're in, say, a
Speaker: A moderate climate doesn't get as cold as what we are here, but you still have times of the year when Mother Nature's kind of fickle, and we're finding that by actually forcing some fresh air into these barns, along with recirculating fans, is having a huge impact on the air quality.
Speaker: And that's something we started, shoot, probably over 10 years ago when we went to the UK and discovered what some of their challenges were, because they thought because the wind blew all the time,
Speaker: that their barns are being ventilated.
Speaker: And once they found out how much better their cows perform, both reproductively, animal health-wise, by us actually forcing some fresh air in, get it to the cow level, had a huge impact on their dairies.
Speaker: And so those type of strategies are catching on more across the whole dairy industry because, again, we're focused on the cow.
Speaker: And that's what animal-centered environment means to me.
Speaker: Very well said.
Speaker: Well, thank you again, Dr. Wolf, for your time and your insights and as always your expertise, keeping your ventilation system in top shape all year long is incredibly important to your herd as well as your bottom line.
Speaker: So thank you everyone who listened into this episode and we will catch you in our next one.
Speaker: Thank you for joining us for another dairy intelligent episode.
Speaker: We hope you have found some suggestions to improve cow comfort on your farm and
Speaker: or simply just learn something new.
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