Sequence of Chore Tasks 



Records covering chore activities 

 on 33 farms* indicate no particular 

 pattern of sequence in which chore 

 practices are undertaken. Five oper- 

 ators followed the order of feeding 

 grain, milking, and feeding hay be- 

 fore breakfast and repeated these 

 tasks in the same order before sup- 

 per. Milking was the first chore in 

 the morning on nine farms. Ten 

 milked after supper. A few fed hay 

 or silage before milking in the morn- 

 ing. One operator curried cows be- 

 fore milking in the morning. 



Apparently there is a wide choice of 

 sequence in the order of doing dairy 

 chores and, as far as known, without 

 affecting production. Practically all 

 operators planned to have not less 

 than an 11-hour interval between be- 

 ginning morning and night milkings. 

 The one exception to this began milk- 

 ing at 6:00 a. m. and at 4:00 p. m.— 

 a ten-hour interval. Over one-half 

 planned to have not over 11% hours' 

 interval between morning and night 

 milkings. It may be important to 

 have the intervals between milkings 

 not more than 13 hours because the 

 cow tends to reduce milk secretion 

 when the pressure in the udder be- 

 comes tense. Consequently there may 

 be some loss in production if the in- 

 terval between milkings is extended. 



For high quality of milk, silage and 

 other feeds with strong odors should 

 be fed after, rather than before, milk- 

 ing. It also may be important not 

 to have frequent major changes in 

 the order of chores, especially in re- 

 spect to feeding, but otherwise the 

 operator has considerable leeway in 

 the order of doing daily chores. 



Schedule of Chore Tasks 



One of the purposes of this study 

 is to project the efficiencies of all the 



individual tasks by reorganization of 

 chore work as a whole. The next 

 step is an attempt to integrate the 22 

 individual chore practices previously 

 discussed into an efficient total sched- 

 ule. Fig. 47 represents one schedule 

 for two men on a 40-cow farm. This 

 schedule for the winter months was 

 developed synthetically but each in- 

 dividual practice was based on the de- 

 tailed studies and projected estimates 

 described previously. The schedule 

 assumes a good layout, two skilled 

 men who have worked out a good 

 barn management program. The data 

 shown in Fig. 47 are intended as de- 

 scriptions of the possibilities. 



The authors of this bulletin have 

 not attempted, and in fact have not 

 had an opportunity, to test out this 

 particular schedule under actual barn 

 conditions. Instead they have had to 

 depend on actual time schedules ob- 

 served on cooperating farms where 

 most, but not all, chores were done 

 efficiently. In every case there were 

 handicaps due to layout and delays 

 in doing one or more tasks. The re- 

 sults on two farms are indicated in 

 Figs. 48 and 49. In total time*, con- 

 verted to a 40-cow herd, one farm 

 was 42 man minutes under the syn- 

 thetic schedule and the other 37 man 

 minutes above the schedule. The rec- 

 ords of these actual chore perform- 

 ances on two farms give a favorable 

 indication that the synthetic schedule 

 can be attained and that chores can 

 be done quickly. 



Similar records on these two farms 

 were taken in 1942, 1949, and in 1950. 

 The barn facilities and the number 

 of animals were practically the same 

 at each period. There had been a 

 change in workers and in practices. 

 The changes in chore time on these 

 two farms are shown in Fig. 50. Prog- 



* These were specialized dairy fai-ms with 

 more than 20 cows. The farms studied in 

 detail were not included. 



* Time on equipment was not obtained in 

 full in either case and so the comparison must 

 be made on basis of not including this item. 

 The cases represented by Fig. 48 and 49 took 

 268 and 347 man minutes (40-cow basis), 

 respectively, as compared to 310 in the syn- 

 thetic schedule. 



54 



