Faulkner Composting Barn

Location: Culverden, Canterbury

BUILDING DETAILS

Size: 108m L by 51m W

Style: Gable

System: Futura Box-Beam 

At Culverden in Canterbury, John Faulkner's new composting barn gives his dairy herd a dry, sheltered place to winter. It is a 108m by 51m gable building on Futura Box-Beam rafters and timber pole columns, built to get cows off winter crop and out of the mud.

Replacing a Wintering System That Wasn't Working

John farms 162 hectares at Culverden, with a separate 47 hectare support block. Every winter the cows went out onto kale and fodder beet on that block. Club root dragged yields down, and by midwinter the paddocks were a mess. One day John met his sharemilker in the middle of a paddock, both of them ankle-deep in mud and carrying standards and reels.

John had written off concrete storage barns years earlier. A composting barn made more sense, but he wanted proof before spending a cent. A whole-farm system analysis showed the return on capital looked good, and a green loan and the investment boost allowance helped with funding.

Built for Canterbury Conditions

The barn sits close to the dairy shed, so cows walk straight out and into the parlour. John's heavy soil made a good base, and the platform sits 700mm above ground.

The tallest poles, down the middle, stand 13.4 metres high. The pole holes kept coming out far bigger than planned, so John switched to a sleeve system. He also chose concrete panels over timber for durability, plus a concrete feed lane with a feed pusher.

The cows lie on deep poplar and pine chip over a hard-packed dirt seal with no drainage. Because the barn has no effluent system, it didn't need an effluent consent. From earthworks to completion, it took 14 months.

Aztech designed the building to keep the bedding dry and moving. An 18-degree roof pitch and a ridge vent draw fresh air in and moisture out, while big overhangs and enclosed gable ends keep driving rain off the bedding. The enclosed box-section rafters leave birds nowhere to perch.

More Than a Wintering Solution

The first mob of cows went into the barn the day it was finished, with people still working around them. John expected chaos. The cows walked in, looked at the roof, found the feed and settled.

"Their stress level just drops phenomenally."

That kind of calm is what good cow comfort in a composting barn is all about.

Winter at Culverden went better than usual, with fewer slips, fewer deaths and no mastitis spike. Calving is easier too. Springers calve inside and one tractor collects the calves twice a day, which John Faulkner calls "a very fluid, easy system." The team is usually done by 11am with no change in staff numbers, and when the weather turns, the whole herd comes into the barn. That's happened several times since calving.

• Condition: each mob took 20 days to reach calving condition score, and rumination went from around 450 on kale and fodder beet to 550 in the barn.
• Production: 18% ahead, and 6% ahead daily. John puts most of the 18% down to using the barn at the end of last season so the cows could keep milking longer.
• Composting: bedding temperatures have sat around 52 to 60°C, peaking at 70.4°C.
• Waterways: modelling shows a 72% cut in N discharge to water from the support block and 9% from the dairy farm, about 850 kg less N overall. That's the wider system change, not the barn alone.

Asked what he'd do differently, John Faulkner didn't hesitate: "Build it bigger." The Culverden barn maxed out at 550 cows and he winters more than that. His advice to other farmers:

"If you're going to put a barn in, go to the experts and get that knowledge."

Thanks, John, for trusting Aztech with the design and supply of this barn.

Thinking About a Composting Barn for Your Farm?

Aztech works with farmers across New Zealand to design and supply strong, practical farm buildings that are built for real on-farm conditions. Whether you are planning a composting barn, feedpad cover, calf shed or other farm infrastructure, our team can help you explore the right structure for your farm system.

Location: Culverden, Canterbury

Application: Dairy, Rural

Reference: C3389