Professor Colman identified Feed Conversion Efficiency as the key performance advantage where the same or lower feed intake generated higher yields per cow. In France, the study showed an average daily milk yield improvement of 2.5 litres from 1kg dry matter less feed representing a feed efficiency increase of around 15%.

In 2008, the first detailed large scale commercial farm study of the benefits of the Mech-fiber™ approach took place at the world renowned Coopon Carse Farm in South West Scotland - one of 5 dairies owned by Wijnand Pon, who farms 4,000 cows and is also the owner of ALTA GENETICS Inc. This has shown the massive commercial potential of Mech-fiber™ and PACE technology.

Firstly, without any change of ration, replacing the unit’s existing vertical mixer with a Keenan Mech-fiber™ unit produced more milk and more protein from less feed. The Keenan achieved improvements worth £0.32 per cow per day - all within 4 weeks. Then using a full Mech-fiber™ ration, the results were even more dramatic with 1.9 kg DM/cow/day less feed producing 0.9 litres more milk/cow/day and with a 0.34% protein lift as well, this gave a total increase in margin of £1.03 cow/day. With the introduction of PACE on the farm, this has risen to a staggering £1.41 per cow per day.

In total, this represents an increase in Feed Conversion Efficiency of 20% - from 1.25 to 1.49 - since the vertical auger mixer was replaced with a Keenan Mech-fiber™ feeder. This has been achieved in just 24 weeks – from 28th July 2008 to 20th January 2009.

These results were achieved on a highly professional unit already achieving a high level of production efficiency. If results like this can be achieved on such a unit, the potential benefits for dairy enterprises around the world are immense.