This ground-breaking series of articles came to us in May of 2014 from The Stockmanship Journal and authors Whit Hibbard and Dr. Lynn Locatelli. After reading it, one of our On Pasture readers wrote to say “We renovated our livestock holding area with the Bud Box after your great series of discussions. THANK YOU … handling is so much safer now.”
The authors decided to write this series because after many years of experience in livestock handling, and in helping producers, feedlots, and other processing facilities, they noticed that the animal behavior they observed, and the handling facilities that worked best, differed greatly from the behavior Dr. Temple Grandin described, and the facilities she designed. They decided to carefully analyze cattle behavior and their response to handling facilities and the result was this series of articles. Their conclusion was that Grandin’s curved, closed sided facilities increase animal stress and increase difficulties for handlers. In this series you’ll find pictures, videos and suggestions for facilities that work best for cattle handling.
We’d love to hear more from you about your own observations, and whether you make changes based on what you learn from this series. While comments are already closed on the individual articles, you can leave comments with this post.
Before publishing the articles, Hibbard and Locatelli contacts Temple Grandin, shared the draft with her, and asked if she’d like to respond. That response is included below. What was interesting to Rachel and I, is that many more people read her response than looked at the article series.
The Bud Box system is cheaper and easier to build. Many times just a few alterations to your present pens will be required. Use your imagination when making a change. If the layout is not quite perfect your stockmanship can make the difference.
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