One little change made all the difference...
May 7, 2015 11:22:49 GMT -5
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midhilldexters, rhonda, and 4 more like this
Post by Dahdo on May 7, 2015 11:22:49 GMT -5
After deciding to start vaccinating my herd this year, I spent a lot of time researching what products to use and when to use them. I got a lot of great information from several of you in another thread on this forum. One of the biggest concerns I had was how to safely and efficiently work my cows with the handling equipment I had. Basically a head-gate and some panels. I could just see our new bull running down the field trailing panels behind him like tin cans on the back of some newlyweds car. The commitment to vaccinate was thus also a commitment to upgrade our handling facilities.
Well, now is the time to vaccinate and the fancy new facilities were not going to be ready. So we improvised. From looking at plans from the Canada Plan Service online, I knew we were going to need a crowding pen and sweep gate in the new facilities. So, I rigged another panel in my panel-pen that would swing, even put a wheel on the outside corner to make it move easier. Ideally the sweep gate is solid so the cattle see no escape other than the alley, so I attached some plastic tarps to the sweep gate and one side of the pen so they would move into the alley as the gate closed. Here is a photo:
www.hifalutindextercattle.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/image1.jpg
It worked perfectly! I could load three cows at a time in the pen, close the sweep gate and have them all lined up in the alley. The other key thing was to have a way to keep the first cow down the alley from backing up when she got to the headgate. For that I slipped a stout 3x4 into a slot created by the space between a T-post and the vertical bar in the center of the panel.
www.hifalutindextercattle.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/image2.jpg
We got the first round of vaccinations done, put on fly tags, 840 tags, wormed, and put on weaning tabs and halters. All in record time with a lot less stress on cows and humans.
www.hifalutindextercattle.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/image.jpg
I'll leave the temporary setup until we do boosters in a month, then take it down and get started building the permanent crowding pen and alley this summer. Learned a lot from this quick and dirty panel pen though--solid walls and a sweep are the way to go.
Dave
Well, now is the time to vaccinate and the fancy new facilities were not going to be ready. So we improvised. From looking at plans from the Canada Plan Service online, I knew we were going to need a crowding pen and sweep gate in the new facilities. So, I rigged another panel in my panel-pen that would swing, even put a wheel on the outside corner to make it move easier. Ideally the sweep gate is solid so the cattle see no escape other than the alley, so I attached some plastic tarps to the sweep gate and one side of the pen so they would move into the alley as the gate closed. Here is a photo:
www.hifalutindextercattle.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/image1.jpg
It worked perfectly! I could load three cows at a time in the pen, close the sweep gate and have them all lined up in the alley. The other key thing was to have a way to keep the first cow down the alley from backing up when she got to the headgate. For that I slipped a stout 3x4 into a slot created by the space between a T-post and the vertical bar in the center of the panel.
www.hifalutindextercattle.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/image2.jpg
We got the first round of vaccinations done, put on fly tags, 840 tags, wormed, and put on weaning tabs and halters. All in record time with a lot less stress on cows and humans.
www.hifalutindextercattle.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/image.jpg
I'll leave the temporary setup until we do boosters in a month, then take it down and get started building the permanent crowding pen and alley this summer. Learned a lot from this quick and dirty panel pen though--solid walls and a sweep are the way to go.
Dave
. He eventually gave in to hunger.
c
