Housing requirements for dairy cattle
When farmers are housing dairy cattle, there are two types of housing style which are tie stalls where cows are tied up in a stall and there is free stalls where cows have more freedom to walk around in a big fenced in stall. These two types of barns do have requirements to reduce stress and promote proper health for cattle.
One requirement is proper flooring. Farmers want to have good flooring because cows spend many hours a day standing. More commonly in free stall barns, I hear of hoof related diseases because of improper concrete flooring which could lead to lameness in a cow. There are also mats in both tie stall and free stall barns but in free stall barns, there are not mats everywhere compared to tie stalls which leads to lameness.
A second requirement is proper bedding. When bedding cows, I like to use straw and sawdust as they both absorb most of the moisture or water under the cows. Other farmers also use sand or shredded newspaper. I have heard in the past from other farmers that if cows not properly bedded, it can lead to fatigue stress which makes cows produce less milk and it effects they’re overall health.
The last requirement to reduce stress is proper ventilation. On farms, there are two main kinds of ventilations which are fans which suck and circulate air threw and out of barn and curtains which are plastic windows attached to side of barn on a rail that go up or down automatically or manually, depending on the temperature. Proper ventilation is required in housing because it reduces high amount of humidity in the winter, in the summer, they remove excessive heat and they remove gases from barns which reduces stress on the cows.