Requirements checklist
What to ask for when choosing software for dairy farms.
A checklist built from how dairy farms work, to print or save as a PDF and bring to any supplier meeting.
What the software should cover
Tick each one that matters to your business.
- Herd register and animal cards
- Milking and yield records
- Breeding and calving calendar
- Health, treatment and withdrawal
- Feed rations and fodder stock
- Milk sales and tank reconciliation
- Heifer and calf rearing
Roles that need their own access
Who logs in, and what each person may see or change.
- For owners
- For the herd manager
- For milkers and herd hands
- For visiting vets
- For farm accountants
Reports to ask for
Ask to see each one with your own sample data.
- Litres per cow per lactation against herd average
- Cows with falling yield this fortnight, by pen
- Calving, pregnancy check and dry-off dates due, by week
- Treatments running with withdrawal end dates
- Feed drawn by pen with stock days remaining
- Cost per litre sold, month by month
- Processor loads sent against statements received
Systems it may need to connect to
Note which ones you already run.
- Milking meter or parlour export file
- SMS
- WhatsApp or other messaging
- Accounting export
Questions for any vendor
Put these to every supplier you are comparing.
- Does it take yield from our parlour?
- How does it warn about treated milk?
- Does it record which bull or straw was used?
- Can I see feed cost for one pen?
- What if the milkers have poor mobile signal in the shed?
- Can the heifers be tracked separately?
- Can the processor invoice be raised here?
- Who owns the herd data?
- How is the cost worked out?
- Do we need a computer in the shed?
Where the work usually breaks today
Circle the ones you recognise. They set the order of the project.
- Yield is known for the tank, not the cow
- Heat and pregnancy dates live in memory
- Treated milk can reach the tank
- Feed cost cannot be tied to milk
- Calves and heifers drift out of sight
Prefer to talk it through? See the dairy farms page.