Livestock handling

HSE is collecting case studies so that famers can share their experiences of making changes to their cattle handling in a range of systems. We are finding that the business benefits are very significant. It is worth taking a look at your system to see whether you can make your business more profitable - and reduce risk.

• Medium sized beef farm - Adam Quinney
  

  The previous system was fairly makeshift consisting of a few gates and a crush. People were getting knocked about and hurt, albeit not seriously, but this led to a certain amount of hesitancy when tasks had to be done.

• Large beef herd - Chalk Hill Farm Partners
  The decision was taken to significantly increase the beef herd numbers and this needed some modification of buildings as well as a rethink on the handling arrangements.
• Medium sized dairy unit - Mark Barnes
  The previous handling system involved moving cows across the yard into another building.  The old system was originally designed for a much smaller herd and as numbers have expanded with more handling, either for herd health or statutory tests, handling cows became a time consuming task. It was also extremely difficult to sort out individual cows for specific tasks.
• Beef herd run on two sites - Richard and Natasha Mann
  The Farm entered the HLS scheme 2 years ago and converted marsh wheat growing land into organic grassland. This meant an increase in herd size from 5 cows up to a planned maximum of 100 cows plus followers.