It is especially true when it comes to milking parlours. On some farms the milking parlour comes to the cows, like in tie-stall barns. On our family farm the cows go to the parlour and that parlour is not what you would expect-it actually moves and resembles a merry-go-round.
Prior to construction and assembly of this new parlour in 2009 our family milked cows on a 50 stall Roto-Flo parlour. Our DeLaval Rotary Parlor holds 100 cows at a time and makes a complete rotation every 9-12 minutes. Each day an average of 1700 cows are milked here, three times a day from 4am-8am, 12pm-4pm, and 8pm-12am. (For those of you doing the math, the cows spend around 10 minutes on the parlour, spend about 15 minutes on their commute to “work”, and basically are “clocked in” for about 2-3 hours a day).
The cows calmly and freely walk on to the slowly moving platform and once on spend the next 10 minutes chewing their cud while their udders are cleaned and prepped and the milking units hung. As the table slowly rotates the cows continue to be milked until the units sense the flow of milk slow then they gently fall off.
Moments before getting off the parlour the cows are checked, by hand, to ensure that they are completely milked and then their udders are protected from bacterial contamination by an iodine dip. The cows then head back to the beds, water and food waiting for them in their barns. While they were being milked the barns and beds are cleaned.
Each dairy farm has their own preferences and methods, from how they feed their cows to how they milk their cows but each difference is a carefully thought out strategy that works for their family, their herd and their farm, including their parlours whether they come to the cows or the cows come to them.
Source: Ask The Farms