A Forge Creek couple has transitioned from beef and sheep farming to robotic dairying with a distinct difference, and they are now inviting the local community to see their operation firsthand.
Believed to be Australia’s first fully-automated, fully-housed freestall dairy barn, the facility features a Lely Automatic Milking Robot, feed pusher, manure collector, cow brush, and milk trolley, all working in unison to run a modern dairy farm with minimal labour requirements.
Reinie and Bree Kennedy, who are six months into their new venture, will host an open day at their property next Wednesday, June 10. Visitors are invited to drop in anytime between 11am and 2pm to tour the barn, see the technology in action, and speak with the family. A hosted question-and-answer session with the Kennedys will take place at 12.30pm.
Robot technicians and farm management experts from Lely Center Gippsland will also be on-site to answer technical questions about dairy automation. The local Lely team currently supports automatic dairy systems on more than 70 Gippsland farms and is scheduled to install its 100th Lely Astronaut milking robot at the Kennedys’ barn later this year.
The decision to construct a barn rather than a conventional pasture-based system came down to local practicality for the Kennedys. Mr Kennedy had previously spent time in England, where housed dairy systems are common, and saw how successfully they could operate. Back in East Gippsland, that logic was reinforced by regional environmental conditions.
“Part of our reason for going with a barn was drought-proofing our farm,” Mrs Kennedy said.
“Our area isn’t known for being dairy farming country, and with minimal irrigation on our farm, being able to stockpile fodder and know how many months or years of feed we have in front of us was important.”
Planning, construction, and installation took just under a year from start to completion. Inside, the technology is purpose-built for low-labour, high-efficiency operation. The Kennedys deliberately began on a small scale, utilising 45 cows and a single robot, to optimise their management approach before expanding. A second robot and additional cattle are planned for later
this year.
Fully-housed automatic dairy barns remain rare across Australia, where traditional pasture-based systems are the norm. owever, industry interest is growing as producers continue to contend with increasingly unpredictable weather patterns, rising feed costs, and a shrinking pool of available agricultural labour.
