Christian and Jasmin Benoit

In 2018, the Benoît family installed milking robots. Since then, the dairy farm, established 43 years ago, has welcomed this investment which allows everyone to have more time to perform other tasks on the farm, such as reproduction, field management and maintenance of the machinery and buildings.

However, transitioning to robotic milking wasn’t their only project! While planning the farm’s transition, they decided to expand the barn to boost and maximize their investment. And, after all these changes, they were also able to add a third milking in their barn routine so they could improve milk yield and milk fat yield.

What do they like about robotic milking, besides mitigating the shortage of workers? The real-time data and information they get on their herd, which a can help them better target their actions to get better results and help them identify metabolic disorders more rapidly in fresh cows.

Because of the farm’s transition to robotic milking and free stall housing, both the animals and the farm workers had to change their habits. The team worked in close cooperation with their dairy nutrition advisor, and many staff meetings were necessary. They had to use new tools, such as checklists, to increase the number of visits to the robots and to better stabilize the new routine of the cows.

“Our relationship with Amélie (Jeannotte of Mondou Feed Mills) is both friendly and professional. She contributes significantly to our business. When she doesn’t have the answer to one of our questions, she’s not afraid to say it. But she always makes certain she finds the right information for us and makes an adequate follow-up,” mentions Jasmin Benoît concerning his dairy nutrition advisor.