Above 1200 Sq/FT Out on Quaker Road

[jblnut]

That's really cool! Definitely the most high tech dairy barn I've seen, for sure.

It is a life changing thing for everyone that has them !!

Thank you, That's very interesting.You said the cow are milked three times a day they just come in on there own? Do they get hay in the barn in-between milking.When the cow comes to be milked dose the tag records how much milk she gives.

The only thing the cows get in the robot as far as feed is the pellet containing mostly protein, fat and minerals. The rest of the feed is fed in front of them free-choice at the feed bunk. It is a mix of corn silage, haylage, baled hay and a few other components. The tag on the cow collar records her activity and rumination activity all day long and transmits that data to the robot every time she gets milked. The robot sends the data to the computer along with whatever information it gathers about the milk (amount, temp, color and conductivity, as well as fat content and protein content).

So the cows are high all day? No wonder they go to the robots on their own. Lol.

My spell check took that one over, it should be Oxytocin, not Oxycontin. Oxytocin is more commonly known in the human world as Pitocin and starts the milk letdown process.

 

[woodfor1]

When the cow comes in to be milk will the the pellets change depending on the milk and the health or are they all the same.

 

[jblnut]

When the cow comes in to be milk will the the pellets change depending on the milk and the health or are they all the same.

There are a number of things that affect the amount and type of pellets each individual animal gets. The main factor is milk production. The more she produces the more she gets fed. The feed type we added for them will be a mix of roasted soybeans and basically little balls of fat. The high producing cows will get it to offset the fat and protein they are putting in the milk.

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

You know what I have not seen on your farm Mike? A REALLY big pipe wrench.

 

[jblnut]

You know what I have not seen on your farm Mike? A REALLY big pipe wrench.

You are correct. Here is an old 8" that is probably all you can handle ....


And here is my newest tool. This is a monster !! 48" Irwin. It's going to be really nice to have for breaking vacuum pumps free on farms .... and I'd imagine it should loosen ANYTHING else I point it at. The 8" is in the photo for a size reference ....


In other news .... I will be installing this wonderful looking pile of Ubiquiti equipment on Monday.

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

It's no Ridgid, but it'll do.

 

[jblnut]

It's no Ridgid, but it'll do.

Go outside and lick your mailbox.

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

Go outside and lick your mailbox.

It gave me splinters

 

[jblnut]

I was starting to think my screws, nails and bolts were possessed as they were seemingly mixing themselves up all on their own but then I caught the culprit in the act

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

Ha, love it!

 

[MNSam]

My son does that with my tools. Stuff will go missing and lo and behold I find it squared away in his box haha.

 

[Terrick down Under]

some of my tools are spread over the front 5 acres, from when he was about 7 to 9 yo. You have to laugh at what they do.

 

[timbitca]

Just got through all this thread.

Very interesting read... having grown up on a (very) small farm it's nice to see we aren't the only ones still using old Farmall's on active duty. Just to give you an idea how small (and old) our operation is our current big tractor is an IH 474. Along with 2 running Farmall's, 1 414, 1 444 and a few other oldies.

I also have a 414 of my own, with all of it's 3900 hours on it. Not bad for being 52 years old. Got any tractors with that few hours on it?

Love seeing all the automated stuff too. Very interesting.

 

[jblnut]

Just got through all this thread.

Very interesting read... having grown up on a (very) small farm it's nice to see we aren't the only ones still using old Farmall's on active duty. Just to give you an idea how small (and old) our operation is our current big tractor is an IH 474. Along with 2 running Farmall's, 1 414, 1 444 and a few other oldies.

I also have a 414 of my own, with all of it's 3900 hours on it. Not bad for being 52 years old. Got any tractors with that few hours on it?

Love seeing all the automated stuff too. Very interesting.

Thanks for reading through it all !! It's turned into more of a novel than I ever thought it would !!

If you ever get sick of any of those "oldies" I'd love to give them a new home. A 474 or 414 would find a nice home here as a daily user to give the ol' M a rest finally so I can fix it up.

We have an IH 886 with 10,100hrs, a JD 7400 with 5,000hrs, a JD 7810 with 5,000hrs, a JD 7630 with 1,600hrs, a Case IH STX325 with 2,000hrs, and the Farmall M and H that don't have hour meters. I'd love to have the 414, if you ever get bored with it I'll gladly take it off your hands

 

[jblnut]

Today we set up the cattle chute and vaccinated the 45 smallest calves again. This is where they hang out until they go in the chute.


I chase them into the chute through this narrowing alleyway made from soybean stray bales.


Mom is loading the syringe and Dad is administering the vaccine.


About a week ago Lily helped me brush the Buick off so I could get to fixing the brakes finally. I put the very dead battery on a trickle charger and it came back to life after about a week. Today I purchased a bunch of brake line fittings and what-not and got it all patched up but I'm pretty sure this car hates me. I had to make sure the brakes worked so I stepped on the brake pedal pretty hard and another brake line blew. ARGH. I'm gonna replace both front ones at the same time then all the lines will be new ......



Dad used to put mouse poison in the middle of a 2' chunk of pipe to keep it out of the reach of the cats and the kids and it works very well but you have to load it every few days it seems so I took the design a step farther. I should be able to load the vertical pipe with poison and not have to fill it nearly as often. Time will tell and we'll see how well it works.

 

[carlquib]

I use one that is very similar for mouse poison. The only thing I do differently is I add another elbow and short piece of pipe so there is a clear run with two exits. When I tried one like yours it didn't work as well as I would have liked because the rodents were reluctant to go into a hole with no exit, on mine when I put the bait in it blocked the middle off. Another plus is they will stand up on their own. My latest version uses a cross and another elbow so there are three entrances and exits. Are you using bar bait in yours so they stay open? I never tried that, I was just using the cheap pelleted stuff.

Hello, my name is Brian and I'm a toolaholic

 

[Contender54]

That's a good idea.
We had been nailing the "one-bite" poison to a shelf or rafter.
I might have to try the pipe idea.

 

[jblnut]

Are you using bar bait in yours so they stay open? I never tried that, I was just using the cheap pelleted stuff.

I use the bar/chunks that are around 1" square and 2" long. I think I'm going to use the same stuff but in about a 6" chunk in these.

That's a good idea.
We had been nailing the "one-bite" poison to a shelf or rafter.
I might have to try the pipe idea.

The pipe works great by itself but I'm hoping this will cut down on some of the bending over to refill them all the time.

 

[jblnut]

My electrical guy got the interlocks and generator cord installed and wired up today. He put a 50a breaker on the left panel for the barns and hayshed and and a 60a on the right for the pump house and human house.


I asked him to put the cord/plug in an old enclosure if he had one to protect it from the sun and he delivered. Gonna maybe fire the generator up this weekend to see if it all works.



The electrician was in and out in less than 3 hours and he did a few other things for me at the same time. I'm not sure now someone can not afford to spend the money to do something like this correctly.

 

[Bib Overalls]

That is an idea worth remembering.

I asked him to put the cord/plug in an old enclosure if he had one to protect it from the sun and he delivered. Gonna maybe fire the generator up this weekend to see if it all works..

 

[fergus]

So your update on getting wifi out in the field made me curious. I'm looking at extending wifi here at the house. We live on 190 acres and need to get wifi to the guest house next door...its only 100 feet away, but everybody complains about no wifi on their phones (laptops and anything with stronger radios does fine though).

But if I'm gonna do it, I might as well do it so we can have wifi on the whole of the 7-8 acres around the house and outbuildings.

Then I started thinking...Could I make it so I get wifi down in the orchard? The closest point is about 1200 ft away... and can be as much as 2000 ft from the house. What about remote monitoring for the tractor that runs the irrigation pump when its running down there? If I could get a signal, it would be pretty easy to send some vitals via an Arduino or some other little board...I'd have 12v power from the tractor.

So the questions are:

1. A Picostation would do the trick around the houses and buildings right?
2. Would that cut the mustard way down at the orchard?
3. Do I need a nanobeam maybe to aim at the tractor? It does sit about 30 feet down a bank from the house elevation...on the FAR side of the orchard... and a signal would have to get through about 8 rows of trees (lost cause without a mast by the tractor?)

I'm a technical guy(software eng) but not a network guy. I guess these are made for pros, but I do see some pretty thorough writeups out there on configs (on Amazon even(!))

Thanks,
Tim

 

[jblnut]

So the questions are:

1. A Picostation would do the trick around the houses and buildings right?
2. Would that cut the mustard way down at the orchard?
3. Do I need a nanobeam maybe to aim at the tractor? It does sit about 30 feet down a bank from the house elevation...on the FAR side of the orchard... and a signal would have to get through about 8 rows of trees (lost cause without a mast by the tractor?)

I'm a technical guy(software eng) but not a network guy. I guess these are made for pros, but I do see some pretty thorough writeups out there on configs (on Amazon even(!))

Thanks,
Tim

1. I would think that one PicoStation would be enough around the house area. I have one mounted about 20ish feet up on a mast and I can pull signal with my 4yr old smart phone damn near 1/4 mile away.

2. Probably not but maybe.

3. I would think that a NanoStation NSM2 down in the orchard could be setup as a station to pull signal from the PicoStation up by the house. The NSM2 has a secondary port that can will pass POE through to another device, such as another PicoStation down in the orchard. Doing this gives you WiFi in the orchard and the ability to get the pump online.

I have installed a number of cameras that pull POE off of a NanoStation through the secondary port and it works great.

If you want to go with AC hardware I'd put a UAP-AC-PRO on the house and use a NBE-5AC-16 (or 19) and another UAP-AC-PRO down by the pump. The UAP-AC-PRO uses a 48v power supply and the NanoBeam uses a 24v one so you'd just need a short cord to go between the LAN ports on the power supplies. Not a big deal. To avoid having a switch down there you can use the secondary port on the UAP-AC-PRO or connect the PC or otherwise via WiFi to the UAP-AC-PRO and away you go.

The trees may present a problem but I'd put up a cheap antenna and mount the NanoStation/NanoBeam to it and put the PicoStation/UAP-AC-PRO above the tree line preferably. The UAP-AC-PRO is weather resistant but can not directly get rained on or wet. It's made to be hung outside under an overhang basically. Mount the UAP-AC-PRO horizontally in a 12x12x6 Cantex gray conduit box attached to the mast and you're all set.

FYI, 1/4 mile radius of coverage is roughly 125 acres .... A NanoStation would easily pick that signal up at 1/4 mile away and I am truly dumbfounded that my phone does as well.


Here is a link to a wonderful guide to setting up the various pieces of equipment that Ubiquiti makes.

https://help.ubnt.com/hc/en-us/sections/200914480-Configuration-Guides

 

[fergus]

Ok cool. That gives me plan to work with. I'll definitely start with a pico on the house. The only problem down in the orchard is lack of power anywhere, other than 12v on the tractor. The tractor gets used for both mowing and (stationary) irrigation. Maybe hang a Nanostation on the tractor with an inverter hahaha.

Thanks again.

 

[jblnut]

Ok cool. That gives me plan to work with. I'll definitely start with a pico on the house. The only problem down in the orchard is lack of power anywhere, other than 12v on the tractor. The tractor gets used for both mowing and (stationary) irrigation. Maybe hang a Nanostation on the tractor with an inverter hahaha.

Thanks again.

The NanoStations draw less than 10w so it could work. It would be a neat install for sure.

 

[jblnut]

That is an idea worth remembering.

I can't take credit for it as I saw it done on a farm I was on recently and thought it was a really neat idea. It is protected from the sun/weather and no one will see a nice chunk of cord they can cut off and run away with.

 

[jblnut]

The lovely Mrs. Jblnut and I haven't taken a trip together since we got married 6.5 years ago so we decided it was time. We flew into Phoenix, AZ Sunday afternoon and came back home Thursday Morning.

Hello Phoenix !!

We got our rental car and since it's a little ricer Toyota I had to take a picture in true ricer Toyota fashion.

The countryside is definitely different than back home in Central Minnesota ...

The first night we stayed at The Grand Hotel in Jerome, AZ. Jerome is an old copper mining town and was really neat to wander around in.

We went through a little shop/museum and saw an auto lift from the 20's. Pretty neat.

When we woke up it had snowed a few inches and was 22F. It looked neat though looking out over the hills in the morning.

We ventured to Sedona, AZ the next day and spent the day driving around on red dirt roads and looking at stuff. Nothing in particular, just driving around and being "touristy." We managed to get the little Toyota very dirty.

Once again there is snow on the ground in the morning. It was really enjoyable watching people freak out because it had snowed. We're driving around and I'm ripping the E-Brake and having a blast and the locals are all spinning out and going in the ditch. We asked around and it barely ever snows in Sedona so when it does no one knows what to do.

The last night we stayed in Phoenix, AZ and went to Fat Cats for supper. I got a high score on the ball game. Damn right.

Flying over Nebraska somewhere I spotted tons of irrigator circles. Each of the smaller ones are between 130-140 acres while the larger ones are 500+ acres. Pretty neat to see.

I checked the mouse poison tubes when I got home and they had almost eaten an entire block already. Nice.

It was back to work on Friday. This in the Rx end of a 3mile link between a pair of Ubiquiti NanoBean 5AC 19's. Works great and I can get almost 160Mbps through the link. It'll be carrying 8ish 1080p cams so there's plenty of headroom

 

[1949 caddyman]

Glad you enjoyed your trip to Arizona!

 

[Bib Overalls]

Flying over Nebraska somewhere I spotted tons of irrigation circles. Each of the smaller ones are between 130-140 acres while the larger ones are 500+ acres. Pretty neat to see.

So you are telling me the large pivots are on a section of land and the walking part with the spray heads are a half mile long. I'll bet they are sucking there water table down faster than it can replentish. That is what is happening here.

 

[STClurker]

just read the whole thread, very interesting to a non-farming type like me. I am curious about a thing or two, do you sell the meat from your cows or do you sell them to a beef plant of some type? (as you can see, I'm not sure what the term would be).

if you look at my avatar, I find things that are rolled over to be interesting. does that happen often? and how did you get the trailer back on its feet?

 

[jblnut]

Glad you enjoyed your trip to Arizona!

I think we must have picked the coldest week of the year but overall it was a lot of fun.

 

[jblnut]

just read the whole thread, very interesting to a non-farming type like me. I am curious about a thing or two, do you sell the meat from your cows or do you sell them to a beef plant of some type? (as you can see, I'm not sure what the term would be).

if you look at my avatar, I find things that are rolled over to be interesting. does that happen often? and how did you get the trailer back on its feet?

Thanks for reading through it all !!

I primairilly sell the steers directly to a packing plant in Green Bay, WI but I'm more than willing to sell to locals as well.

The only thing I remember recently that has rolled over was a gravity box. I believe it's back on Page 12 Post #234. We hooked a 6" wide tow strap onto the frame and I pulled it back upright with another tractor while dad drove the one it was hooked to forward. It came out really easily.

 

[jblnut]

Today was a good, and spendy, day. While doing my last camera install I noticed the dairyman had a grinder mixer in the shed he wasn't using anymore. I told him I wanted to buy it as it had the features I was looking for and here we are. Dad and I went to get it today. He's going to run it through his shop and grease/change oil/ and clean it up and hopefully next weekend we can use it.


It will be named "Big Red" as it is over twice as large as the one I currently use.

 

[1949 caddyman]

I think we must have picked the coldest week of the year but overall it was a lot of fun.

We have been having a cold & wet winter this year but our resevoirs were low so when the high country snow melts it will help to fill them.

 

[jblnut]

We have been having a cold & wet winter this year but our resevoirs were low so when the high country snow melts it will help to fill them.

This is the same thing everyone kept telling us while we were there. I rather liked the weather, it was in the 50's so it was warmer than it was at home !!

 

[jblnut]

It's been bugging me that my outdoor rated electrical panels that feed my property are outside and exposed to the elements. I know it might sound funny but I don't like it. I decided to build a roof over them at least to keep the snow and rain from hitting the tops of them.

The roof will pivot out of the way when one needs to be in there real close to do something. I'll show that in action when it's all mounted.

When my hay shed was built the first downspouts that were put on didn't turn out very well so I've repurposed a few of them into some trim for the little roof.

I saved all the cover sheets from the steer barn and hay shed thinking I may need some tin one day and guess what ?!?!? I do !! I think I need another piece of ridge cap though .....

 

[Firebrand]

Saved roofing tin is always worth ten times it's weight in gold! I do the same and it always pays off in big dividends. Never have quite enough ridge cap though!

 

[Terrick down Under]

Hey, those short sheets always come in handy fro jobs around the place.
DW used to work at the delivery hub for Laser sheeting ( acrylic roofing sheets). the deliveries always had a top and bottom cover sheet to protect the order, this would be cast aside for the final loading. well all these sheet were put in a pile for the never never. When we loaded them onto my big ute it took three loads that had sheets from 9m (27') and down to the shortest was 2.4m (8') each stack was 300mm (12") high. It took my son and I 30 minutes to hand unload each load. I have been using those sheet for the last 12 years and are just getting towards the end of it. The main carport 9x6m (27x20)over the hoist has been completely covered with light blue/grey 2.4m sheets

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

It's been bugging me that my outdoor rated electrical panels that feed my property are outside and exposed to the elements. I know it might sound funny but I don't like it. I decided to build a roof over them at least to keep the snow and rain from hitting the tops of them.

The roof will pivot out of the way when one needs to be in there real close to do something. I'll show that in action when it's all mounted.

When my hay shed was built the first downspouts that were put on didn't turn out very well so I've repurposed a few of them into some trim for the little roof.

I saved all the cover sheets from the steer barn and hay shed thinking I may need some tin one day and guess what ?!?!? I do !! I think I need another piece of ridge cap though .....

I approve this update.

 

[jblnut]

Saved roofing tin is always worth ten times it's weight in gold! I do the same and it always pays off in big dividends. Never have quite enough ridge cap though!

If all I have to do it buy a piece of trim once in a while I'll be happy happy happy.

Hey, those short sheets always come in handy fro jobs around the place.
DW used to work at the delivery hub for Laser sheeting ( acrylic roofing sheets). the deliveries always had a top and bottom cover sheet to protect the order, this would be cast aside for the final loading. well all these sheet were put in a pile for the never never. When we loaded them onto my big ute it took three loads that had sheets from 9m (27') and down to the shortest was 2.4m (8') each stack was 300mm (12") high. It took my son and I 30 minutes to hand unload each load. I have been using those sheet for the last 12 years and are just getting towards the end of it. The main carport 9x6m (27x20)over the hoist has been completely covered with light blue/grey 2.4m sheets

I've love to have that gold mine .... that stuff is spendy.

I approve this update.

Good to know you approve. I was waiting. My day can now continue. Thanks for that.

 

[Big Dad]

https://scontent-ort2-1.**.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-0/s480x480/16388342_660713844135632_1214476550553095834_n.jpg?oh=e0e7428cb063d7d034e44859beca5907&oe=58FEDF45