Question on hay rack for dairy heifer

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Hi, everyone. We've been culling, and re-arranging the barn, and the livestock. Our dairy heifer has always had to eat her hay off the ground, but now will have access to the loafing shed. I would like to build a hayrack for her on the outside of some sliding (wooden) windows, so it could be filled from the inside. There is currently a goat hayrack there, built to the design in Harvey Considine's book, and re-printed in Countryside magazine. Would it work to take out like every-other slat? Also the slats are slanted, at a 63 degree angle, should they be straight for a cow? If anyone knows how far apart the slats should be, or whether they should be straight, I would really appreciate some advice. I'm not opposed to re-building from scratch, if anyone can advise me of a place to find plans--preferably on the internet, any livestock books from our library have to be ordered, and can take from weeks to months to get. Thanks in advance for your help. KT

-- K.T. Simon (KTS@hotmail.com), August 06, 2001

Answers

Driving past numerous cow dairies in the area I have seen feeders that have the slats that are slanted and also the keyhole feeders, it may work to take out every other slat so the cow can get the hay out.

-- Leslie in Western WA (sundaycreek@gnrac.net), August 06, 2001.

The slant you mention is to tryto keep your cattle from puttin there head in and out of the feeder all the time. They have to turn the head sideways a bit to get it in and out. This is to prevent them from getting a great big mouthful of hay then backing out, chewing up that directly in the mouth and leting the rest fall down on the ground. Pick it up---no way, just walk on it and get some more from the feeder. But even the slant is not much help really. A cow is just born to waste hay. Don

-- Don (dairyagri@yahoo.com), August 06, 2001.

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