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programme available at North Florida Holsteins through long term family friend Dr Raymond Hunter of the recently dispersed Drumkee herd, Chicago, he was eager to apply. Taking on graduates from around the world the farm can accommodate up to 8-10 students at any one time. “I applied to North Florida because as well as being interested in the opportunity to see America it was also appealing to be involved in a large scale operation and gain greater insight in to the industry as a whole. I had heard about the impressive set up there and thought I would benefit from the detailed system they run.”


Having been accepted on to internship Andrew headed off in July 2013 for 54 weeks, working for 52 weeks and then enjoying two weeks travelling before he returned home.


The herd is owned and managed by Don Bennink, originally a barrister in New York who established the herd in 1980 with 125 cows. Don won World Dairy Man of the Year in 2010 having built up the herd to 4000 milking cows and employing 100 staff.


Cows are milked three times a day, meaning the 40/40 parlour is going 24 hours a day with five people working on each eight hour shift. “This was a great example of efficient parlour use,” explains Andrew. “The milking herd was split in to 10 groups including heifers, maximum production, fresh and stale groups. Splitting them in to groups allowed them to be managed specific to their stage of lactation.” The entire farm was split into departments with a head manager known as the ‘boss’


TOP LEFT Seven milk tankers are filled each day by the 4000 cow herd at North Florida.


TOP RIGHT During his trip Andrew was involved in taking a team of cows to Florida State Fair.


RIGHT Embryo transfer work is carried out at Relough every month to accelerate genetic progress.


THE JOURNAL DECEMBER 2014 39


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