There are three basic ways to communicate with cattle: sight, sound and touch. Cattle prefer to communicate through line of sight, so designing a building with a thorough understanding of the links between their eyesight and their movement and behavior is critical.

In 2016, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health examined 130 occupations and found laborers and farm owners had the highest rate of deaths due to stress-related conditions like heart and artery disease, hypertension, ulcers, and nervous disorder.

Originally introduced in the 1996 Farm bill, EQIP (short for Environmental Quality Incentive Program), is still a part of the proposed 2018 Farm Bill. However, an EQIP Improvement Act has been introduced to make changes that will have some impact on livestock producers.

Clark Stoller talks about why his farm in Gridley, Illinois, chose to build a Monoslope Beef Barn instead of some of the other options available.

A building provides shelter. True statement. But just like today’s protein producers, today’s livestock facilities must work smarter and harder to be flexible, more tech-savvy, more informed, and collaborative to allow producers to be profitable, productive and sustainable.

Too much or not enough of any resource can cause producers problems. Water is a big one – essential to life and a resource that continues to require more attention and management.

When summer heat hits, cattle can become stressed when exposed to high temperatures, still air, high humidity, etc. Animal welfare is important to cattle producers. While you cannot control the weather, bringing cattle into a Summit Livestock monoslope facility allows producers to the optimize the environment and mitigate some of the biggest challenges caused by hot weather exposure.

Ashton Gronewold is a cow-calf producer from Carthage, Illinois. Building a Summit Livestock Facilities monoslope has allowed their family’s operation to grow, now involving and supporting several generations.