🛖 Cowshed

A cowshed is a building where cows live. Here they eat, rest and shelter from cold, heat and rain. A good cowshed is dry, bright and roomy, with plenty of fresh air.

There are different ways of housing cows. In tie-stall housing, each cow has her own place, a stall, where she is tied. In loose housing, cows walk freely around the building and lie down to rest in separate cubicles. There is also a system with shared deep bedding: the cows lie on one large layer of straw or other material.

A cow constantly gives off heat and moisture. So a cowshed needs good ventilation: it replaces the warm, damp air with fresh air. Ventilation can take up to a quarter of all the energy a dairy farm uses. How comfortable cows are directly affects their health, breeding and milk yield. It is important that they have enough space and time to lie down and rest. In the past, large cowsheds had a hayloft at the top — an attic for hay. Next to it there was often a milk house, an annex where milk was collected and stored before it was sent off.