Flexibility for the future

POSTVILLE, Iowa — As Brian and Monica Enyart’s children grew, so did the list of nightly responsibilities on and off the farm. To give themselves more flexibility, Enyart Dairy Farm implemented three Lely Astronaut A5 robotic milkers, a Lely Juno Flex automatic feed pusher, two Lely Discovery manure collectors and a Lely Luna brush.

“We had talked about doing robots for a while,” Monica Enyart said. “I was getting to the point where my shoulders, knees and feet were sore every day, and we were missing so many things with the kids too.”

The Enyarts used a Choose Iowa Dairy Innovation Grant to help with the cost of adding the automation. The grants are awarded each year to farms looking to adopt technologies that reduce labor and increase on-farm processing of Iowa dairy products.

The first night the Enyarts adjusted the chore schedule to attend an event is one Monica will not forget soon.

“I can’t even talk about it, I’ll just cry,” Monica said. “Attending those events during what was our milking time and knowing that we can actually participate without having to worry about what’s going on at home, that’s exactly why we did what we did.”

The freestall barn at Enyart Dairy was expanded by 100 feet to add more sorting pens and 19 stalls. In total, 45 stalls were added as the Enyarts plan to expand their herd from 120 to 180 to maximize use of their robots.

Currently, the Enyarts milk 150 cows that average 2.9 milkings per day. Prior to the robots, the family milked their herd twice a day in a double-8 parallel parlor.

Since finishing construction, the Enyarts have seen a steady climb in daily milk production, with the herd now averaging 91 pounds per day.

“Our number per day has been trending up,” Monica said. “That’s been the hardest part of this transition. Every couple of months, we’d have something change, and we’d go backwards a little bit, then we’d get back to where we were.”

The construction was done in phases, with the feed pusher being the first chapter in 2024. Construction on the robots finished in September 2025, and the manure collectors were ready in April 2026.

“Cows are definitely creatures of habit,” Monica said. “When doing a retrofit, it’s a long process of things changing. Now that we have the manure collectors done, I feel like they can actually get used to having everything the way it’s going to be.”

The automation builds on a foundation of dairy farming that extends back generations on both sides of the family. Their herd is Brian’s family’s herd, and Monica’s parents were also dairy farmers and were the first in Allamakee County to put in robots.

Enyart Dairy introduced themselves to what a robotic milking system could offer six years ago when they began using a collar-monitoring system on their herd.

“We thought we would start there and see how we could use the information,” Monica said. “If we liked it, we thought we’d move into robots. I appreciate all the data points I can see on the computer, because I can go back and try to figure out why a cow got sick, or what we can do differently down the road.”

Their change to a robotic management style also brought a change in responsibilities, one that the Enyarts have worked through as they gain experience with their new milking operation.

“We’re trying to teach our kids that you can’t just come down here and look at the fetch list,” Monica said. “If you come in at 3, and they’re used to you coming at 6, you have got to look for those cows that aren’t used to you coming in (that early). If you don’t, then maybe the next morning they’ll be really far out from their last milking.”

Timing the transition to their automated system came as their oldest, Olivia, enters her senior year of high school, while their son, Bradley, enters his sophomore year. The youngest, Jacob, will begin sixth grade this fall.

“We could have milked in our parlor for another 10-15 years easily,” Monica said. “We thought, ‘Do you want to milk in the parlor and miss their high school years, or do you want to switch to robots and get used to that transition so the kids can decide if they want to be part of it?’ Now they can grow up with it a little bit before they decide if they want to be part of the farm.”