RESEARCH IN MILKING INTERVALS APPLYING DIFFERENT TYPES OF MILKING PARLOURS

The main problem in using the AMS is that cows do not attend the AMS voluntarily. To ensure milking three or four times a day, in many farms cows are driven to the AMS several times a day. Representatives of companies recommend that it only takes place at the beginning and at the end of a workday. In such a case, cows gradually get used to milking as many times a day as it is intended. However, the question is - does this really happen? Next to the concern regarding the provision of the intended milking times a day, farmers are also worried about milking interval dispersion. Appropriate studies were carried out to see what happens in farms, where cows are driven to the AMS in the morning and in the evening only. At the same time, analogous studies were carried out in a holding, where cows were milked with milking parlour. The studies were conducted in two holdings. In the first holding, cows were milked with the AMS, but in the second - with parallel parlour. Ten cows were selected for each experimental group, and the studies lasted for 15 days. They determined the number of milking times per day (milking/day), and the distribution and dispersion of milking intervals. The results of the study showed that in practice it was possible to achieve that the AMS is attended more than 3 times a day, on the condition that only cows with a milking interval of more than 13 hours are driven to the milking site in the morning and in the evening. However, at the same time it was found that there would always be cows in a herd that have been milked both more and less than three times a day. When milking with the AMS, milking intervals vary widely, yet in 80 % of the cases they vary between 5 and 6 hours. First lactation cows (as compared to older cows) are more inert to attend the AMS, and their dispersion of milking intervals is greater. In turn, milking parlour ensures that all cows undergo the set number of milking times and it helps keep smaller fluctuations in milking intervals. If 60 to 80 cows are milked in one group, the fluctuation of the milking interval does not exceed 2 hours.