NMR has introduced a UK-wide shuttle hire service for milk sampling from robotic milking systems to enable routine or one-off milk sample testing for quality purposes, disease or pregnancy diagnosis. This investment follows a 15-month trial carried out by NMR with the Ori-Collector shuttle in northern England.
The shuttles can be used with Lely, Fullwood or DeLaval robotic milking systems. Attached to the milking robot, it will collect a representative sample of milk to be taken from each cow during 12 to 18 hours.
One shuttle is required per robot, so a herd milked with two robots and run in one group would require two shuttle hires to collect samples simultaneously. If the herd is run in two groups, with a robot in each, for example, then two shuttles must still be hired, but this does not need to be at the same time. The cost per each shuttle hire is £40 plus VAT.
The hire charge per shuttle includes delivery to the farm, setting up for sample collection, returning to collate and pack up the samples, cleaning the shuttle and sending samples to the laboratory for testing. This is all carried out by a trained NMR technician.
“Individual cow milk samples are needed for determining milk constituent values, and for some disease diagnosis,” said NMR’s Justin Frankfort. “The shuttles are particularly useful for taking milk samples for Johne’s testing which is required by a number of milk buyers and farms on the Red Tractor farm assurance scheme.”
Shuttle hire can be booked through NMR Customer Services on 03330 043 043
