The 2025 Koroit Show and Field Day, held on February 22, has been labelled a roaring success.
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00:00So Bec, tell me what Southwest TAFE has set up here at the Karooit Field Day.
00:04Yeah, so we've got our birthing cow simulator that we purchased from Canada about three years ago.
00:10So about three years ago we started to see a need in the industry to support the dairy farmers a little bit more around calving time.
00:16So we purchased her from Canada. She's based in Canadian genetics.
00:22So inside her is a 35 kilo calf, lifelike calf, that's fully flexible like a real calf.
00:28We've got the ability to show students how to put the hand in, identify the position the calf is in, attach the ropes or chains.
00:36To be able to come back around and look inside the cow and start to create a picture in their head of what the cow and calf are actually doing.
00:43To give them a little bit more control over calving time and hopefully lessen the amount of time the vets need to come out.
00:49The good thing about her is that we can pull her backside out and we can put a different backside in and we can teach people how to artificially inseminate.
00:56Which is something that we started to see a shortage through COVID with all the borders closing.
01:01And I can also teach people how to preg test as well.
01:04So underneath her is also a milk receiver can.
01:08So we can put milk in all four quarters, we can put yogurt in a quarter, we can simulate mastitis.
01:13Teach people how to strip the mastitis, teat seal, those sorts of things.
01:18So a lot of team care.
01:20And then once we brought her in and we started doing a lot of shows and we started incorporating her in our Certificate 2, 3 and 4 in Ag training.
01:28We started to see the need to get out to the schools and start planning to see her early with Ag.
01:34So we do a lot of trips out to the primary schools and the high schools around where does milk come from and those sorts of things.
01:39And then over the last 12 to 18 months we started to really branch out into the sheep world.
01:44So then we've been lucky to be able to purchase our first sheep birthing simulator.
01:48That we purchased from Canna.
01:50She's only been in Australia for about a week now.
01:52So inside her is also two life-size lambs.
01:56Completely movable, flexible, exactly like a lamb.
02:00So again, putting them inside with lubricant and then being able to teach the farmers and the young people how to identify the position that the lambs are in as well.
02:10So, and we incorporate in all the training.