Welcome to Modern Agriculture!
Teagasc Trial Data: It is widely known for years that cattle housed on slatted rubber mats have been shown to gain weight faster than animals housed on bare concrete slats. Teagasc carried out an intensive trial comparing 360 Beef Bullocks using; 3 different Slatted Rubbers, out-wintering Pads and bare concrete slats. The results from the Teagasc Trial on Slatted Rubber for 2006 & 2007 are summarised in the bar charts below. The Durapak mat is colour coded BLUE. Mat B & C are two well known competitor products. Durapak Slatted Rubber came out on top with 14kgs of extra carcass weight over and above bare concrete slats and together with a higher carcass classification was worth between €45 - €55 per head of animal.
The main reason that Durapak slatted Rubber out performed its competitors is because the product is softer, warmer and more comfortable than other similar products on the market. The earlier designed product had ‘square’ corners and were prone to damage by heavy animals.
As a company we replaced earlier mats at a discount to farmers and at a rate that provided good returns to them.
The newer designed product with ‘ Rounded’ corners (which has been available for the last three years) is working very well and providing an even better return on investment for farmers.
It is worth noting that like some of our competitors we could supply harder mats that would last longer but be of very little benefit to the animals or to the farmer as proved by Teagasc in their preliminary Beef Trials.
If you are considering purchasing slatted rubber you should really look at a number of items as follows:
Below is a worked example of a farmer with 10 pens of 14’6” slats purchased from Banagher concrete and considering the costs / benefits if he was to install slatted rubber.
As you can see from the table the Durapak Mat will pay for itself in 2 – 2.5 seasons whereas mats B & C will take between 4.5 and nine seasons to pay for themselves.
Investment / Returns Trial Data
Worked Example: 10 pens Banagher concrete slats 14’6’’ + 2’ back and 2’ in front. (4.8m x 5.61m = 26.93m²/pen)
