Sustainability is more than a buzzword; it’s a necessity nowadays. But we know it can be tough to figure out how to make it work on the farm. To help, we’re starting a series where we’ll share real-life stories about making farms more sustainable. To get things rolling, here’s a great example from our 2023 Sustainability Report.
“We still milk every cow one at a time,” says Ken McCarty, co-owner at McCarty Family Farms LLC, Rexford, Kansas. “Animal welfare is something that has been ingrained in our family for over a century.”
The only difference is how the family does it. Today, the McCartys use big data to track their herd but also get detailed insights into how each cow is performing. “Having that granular data allows us to manage a large number of cows on an individual basis,” adds Ken.
“It’s all about treating the cow right. We make sure they have good housing and comfortable conditions. But we also have advanced methods like body condition scoring cameras to make sure our nutritionists have the right information to feed the cows in the right way. We do a lot of data tracking when it comes to health and productivity and we share that information with our vets and nutrition teams and monitor them ourselves on a weekly basis.”
Ken also believes that good animal welfare contributes to sustainable operations in every sense of the word. “Happy and calm cows are easier and safer to work with and the environment is better for our team members. Healthier cows are also more productive which decreases the carbon footprint. There are multiple benefits aside from our moral obligation to do the right thing, which is really what motivates us in the first place.”
Walking the talk: third-party certification
To make sure they are always performing in the best possible way, McCarty Family Farms have gone a step further than most. They have sought out third-party auditors to verify and validate their work as well as give them recommendations on improvements.
“The most stringent audit we do is the Validus dairy care certification (validusservices.com). They do an annual independent audit of our farm but they don’t just check our animals and their physical health. They also interview team members to ensure we are doing what we say we are doing.”
The farms also work with the U.S Dairy FARM (Farmers Assuring Responsible Management) program and in addition, they have been B Corporation Certified. B Corporations are certified by the international non-profit B Lab network and must follow high standards of sustainable management in all areas to achieve certification.
“These certifications are all great and they have helped us get better by providing new inputs and recommendations, but we also try to go beyond that. It’s about enhancing the livelihood of our cows, such as grooming brushes in our pens, rubber mats, scratcher pads and even music in our barns.”
It turns out that cows like classical music the most but also respond well to country music; something that the team members in the McCarty farms also like. The cows get a bit of both and everyone is happy.
DeLaval contribution
McCarty Family Farms have brought in a considerable amount of DeLaval equipment to help reach the best levels of animal welfare, from milking rotaries (DeLaval Rotary E500) to the teat-spray robots (DeLaval TSR), but also swinging cow brushes and rubber mats as well as data analysis tools like DeLaval DelPro™ FarmManager.
All of this equipment, together with a holistic view on sustainability helps the McCartys take the best possible care of their herd. The next step in their development is improving breeding strategies and using data to understand how to produce the most healthy and environmentally friendly animals they can.
“We may, for example, see that one cow has low resistance to mastitis and then we can breed her to a bull that is strong in this resistance,” says Ken McCarty as an example.
And beyond animal welfare, the farm is also working very closely with ensuring social sustainability, providing a safe and fulfilling workplace for all of the 250 people working there.
“We’re committed to the viability of our farm not just today and tomorrow but also for the next generation and beyond. We can’t achieve those things if we don’t take care of the animals and don’t have a viable ecosystem around us.”
• Discover more about the McCarty Family Farms at their website.
Read press release: Championing sustainable farming: Cows come first in Kansas