ress had been made over an eight- 

 year period. In one case from 473 to 

 248 man minutes and in the other 

 case from 541 to 329 man minutes. 



Summer Chore Schedules 



Chore work so far has been related 

 to the winter barn stabling period. In 

 the pasture season and also for a 

 short period in fall and spring some 

 tasks can be eliminated entirely and 

 others done partially or occasionally. 

 Milking, care of equipment, and feed- 

 ing grain require about the same ef- 

 fort and time. Occasionally in spring 

 and fall the cows get their udders and 

 teats covered with mud and their 

 preparation for milking requires ex- 

 tra time and upsets the milking 

 schedule. Fencing off certain , wet 

 areas or spreading gravel in the 

 yards may reduce this difficulty. Cows 

 are tied up and turned out twice a 

 day. Cleaning the barn and spread- 

 ing bedding require very little time. 

 Fig. 51 describes one schedule for 

 doing the chores on a 40-cow herd, 

 where two men work together to ac- 

 complish both morning and evening 

 chores. Both men would be available 

 for field or other work from 8.:00 a. m. 

 to 4:30 p. m. 



Fig. 51 also describes a modifica- 

 tion of this schedule: one man doing 

 all the evening chores in order to 

 permit the other man to continue 

 field work. One man starting after- 

 noon chores at 4:00 p. m. would com- 

 plete the task at about 6:40 p. m. 



April and October Schedule 



At the present time most farmers 

 house their cows from October 1 

 through April, a period of seven 

 months. The chores during October 

 and April are usually about the same 

 as in midwinter except that many 

 have their cows outside for several 

 hours on good days. A full chore 

 schedule in the barn in these months 

 tends to delay completion of fall field 

 woi'k and handicaps spring work. 



The chore work for these months 

 can be reduced by planning in ad- 

 vance so that roughage can be fed 

 outside with very little labor. Forty 

 cows will consume from 6 to 15 tons 

 of hay per month, depending on the 

 amount of silage fed and the size of 

 the cows. If an operator plans to 

 feed 12 tons of hay in October and 12 

 tons in April, he can build two inex- 

 pensive hay self-feeders (Fig. 52) in 

 separate yards near the barn to hold 

 about 12 tons each. He can fill these 

 with his usual hay harvest methods in 

 haying season. Supplies of hay are 

 available to the cattle by opening the 

 gate. Some dairymen supplement 

 their pastures every year by feeding 

 hay for a limited period every sum- 

 mer. Most dairymen do this in very 

 dry summers. The same procedure 

 of using a self-feeder would be con- 

 venient in this summer period. Three 

 12-ton self-feeders in separate small 

 yards would enable the operator to 

 use one of these for each of the three 

 periods:, spring, summer and fall. 

 These self-feeders need not be expen- 

 sive. 



MAN 



MINUTES 



600 n 



500 - 



400 



300 



200 



100 



1945 1949 1950 



1945 1949 1950 



Fig. 50. 



57 



FARM A FARM B 



This indicates the progress 

 in chore work on two farms. 

 Most cooperating farms 

 made progress at the be- 

 ginning and then leveled 

 off. These two operators 

 persisted. All data are ad- 

 justed to a 40-cow herd (35 

 milking). 



