The importance of calibrating your concentrate feeding station

Your dairy cows mainly visit the concentrate station to take in the right amount of concentrate. If you do not provide the right amount of concentrate feed per cow, maximum milk production will not be achieved. AgruniekRijnvallei reports that.

In the milking robot or in the concentrate feeding station, usually between 300-350 grams of pellets are dosed per minute. The weight of the concentrate load depends on its composition. As a result, the amount of concentrate per cow can vary greatly. In practice, deviations of up to about 10% occur! To express this in costs, AgruniekRijnvallei has made an example calculation below.

Sample calculation
Suppose an average of 4.5 kg of concentrates per cow/per day is fed on a dairy farm with 100 dairy cows. If the deviation is 5%, 8,213 kg of concentrate feed is overfed per year. Assuming that concentrate feed costs an average of €0.25 per kg, this comes to €2,053 per year. If you do not regularly calibrate your concentrate feeding station, this will cost a lot of money on an annual basis.

Tips for calibration
Calibration can be done simply by collecting and weighing a number of portions. One portion is insufficient for a reliable calibration. You can collect the feed in a bucket or plastic bag. Then weigh the concentrate using a scale and write down the weights. At the end, you can adjust the weight per portion in the computer of your concentrate station. -

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