Dairy Farming

by **dwadedude** » Sun Jun 03, 2012 5:25 pm

I'm new to this site. I am in need of some help. If anyone has an Idea on how much a 100-180 free stall barn would cost to build that would be great. My father owns a beef farm so I have all the equipment except the barn and the milking machines. Which is better, a pit barn or scrapers and a lagoon.? Any assistance would be much appreciated. I am open to suggestions and other ideas also.

by **countrycattle** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 3:55 pm

We have just gone through all the planning for something like this so have lots of estimates! We were planning on a freestall barn with side feeding for around 60 dairy cows.(our old dairy barn was falling down) Including a milking parlor and no pit or scrapers. The estimates were around $250,000. A little cheaper alternative is a bedding pack barn. Decided we did not want that debt. We sold our dairy cows four weeks ago and are looking into beef cattle.

by **TexasBred** » Mon Jun 04, 2012 8:11 pm

dwadedude wrote:I'm new to this site. I am in need of some help. If anyone has an Idea on how much a 100-180 free stall barn would cost to build that would be great. My father owns a beef farm so I have all the equipment except the barn and the milking machines. Which is better, a pit barn or scrapers and a lagoon.? Any assistance would be much appreciated. I am open to suggestions and other ideas also.

Go visit some dairies....various barns and methods of dairying. Better yet work on one for a couple of years and see waht you think works best. Seems they use to say to figure about 10 grand per cow for an investment.