Aerial view of the dairy barn It was an exciting final day in New Zealand. This morning we departed our hotel at 8:30 am for a very impressive robotic dairy. This was the 4th dairy we have seen since we landed here, but it was far different from any of the others because it was much more similar to a North American style of operation. Their animals were confined and fed a ration in a freestall barn that consisted of corn silage, alfalfa silage, grass silage, and a mix of canola, soy hulls, and other ingredients. The cows had mattresses to lay on and all of the floors were covered in rubber. In addition to the robot milkers, they also had automated manure scrapers to rid the barn of the “effluent” or manure as we call it. Fresian cow standing on the rubber mat freestall bed, also shown is manure scraper and rubber flooring   Our Dairy Club Members Bennet, Katelyn, Kirby, Katelyn, and Angel Another difference from this dairy and the others that we saw