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Madison Co. Virginia | From a dairy perspective, I could see a shrinking of the 'ideal' farm size back down to under 1000 cows. That would be nearly just an owner-operator position though, with a lot of contracts in place to keep the tech functioning like it should.
That futuristic herd would be run on a hybrid grazing/tmr model, with complete computer tracking of everything the cow does. Each cow has her own headlock, and is being robotically fed an individual tmr. Her feed refusals are analyzed and reused as a feed ingredient for someone else lower down on the totem pole. Every step she takes in the field is tracked by GPS, and every bite she takes from the pasture is noted. If the whole herd bypasses a square-foot patch of pasture, then a survey robot is sent out to see what unpalatable weed is growing in that spot. The whole farm is being managed on a square-foot basis. The species and fertility of these millions of tiny 'fields' is known, and can be sprayed, planted, and fertilized individually.
Calves are all raised on the dam. 10% of the calves are replacement heifers, and the other 90% are implanted beef embryos. All calves get weaned using weaning flaps or some modern equivalent of such. The heifers and beefers all stay in the herd, and their individual TMR rations are adjusted according to age and stage of growth. The whole herd, from the day-old calf, to the dry cows, fresh cows, stockers, and feeders, are all in a single group for their entire lives; they never meet a stranger to upset the herd dynamics. Slaughter happens on the farm for welfare reasons; zero stress right up until the gunshot. The carcasses are bled out, and loaded into a refrigerated truck for transport to the packer.
The parlor is fully robotic, and is sized for quick batch milking. During the grazing season, the cows are milked on a regular schedule. During the winter, the cows come and go through the same parlor on a voluntary basis.
A huge part of dairy farming would be conservation and recreation. The sale of milk and meat would be mostly just a way to make it happen. A typical dairy farm would be near a large housing development, and the cow lanes are routinely being used by bicyclists and bird watchers. In the same way that many housing developments are depending on close access to national park land to provide green space for their residents, pastoral settings like these dairies would be doing that for other housing developments.
Sales of fluid milk would be a fraction of what they are today. Cheese would be lower, but still sold in enough volume to make it all feasible. Steaks would still be real beef; Hotdogs are almost exclusively lab-grown meat.
This is an idealistic scenario, in my mind, but isn't completely out of the question. | |
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What does the future of farming look like?
