An effective milking routine is vital for a dairy farm to ensure that the highest quality milk possible is delivered from the farm.
A ineffective milking routine could be aiding the spread of bacteria, increasing the number of mastitis cases and/or cell counts.
It could also be increasing the amount of time milking and thus the overall working hours on the farm.
Milking routine
Hygiene has a key role to play in every milking routine. It is important that clean, disposable gloves are worn and changed if needed.
Milkers should also wear a clean apron or milking waterproofs and should keep the parlour clean throughout the milking process.
The milking process and environment should also be stress-free. There will be times when this doesn’t happen, but for the most part that should be the aim.
Many farms have the radio or music playing, which appears to help keep both the cows and milker a little bit calmer.
It is important that clusters are attached to clean and dry udders; clusters should not be attached to dirty udders.
The advice is to start with the back-right cup and work in an anti-clockwise direction.
This means attaching the back right, followed by the front right, followed by the front left and lastly the back-left cluster.
Once the cluster has been attached it is important to check that it is sitting squarely on the cow.
This will cut down on liner slip and ensure that the cow is milked correctly.
Mastitis
Another key part of a milking routine is having a mastitis treatment protocol in place for when cases occur.
Mastitis is something that every dairy farm has to deal with, and having a good treatment plan in place is key to successfully treating cases.
It is important to know what bacteria you are dealing with to determine what treatment is required for every mastitis case.
This should be discussed with a vet or milk quality advisor.