The Progressive Group – Niverville Manitoba

In the spring of 2023, The Progressive Group of Niverville, Manitoba was looking to improve biosecurity and save labor in one of their sow barns. The farm is running a 4-week batch production system, which puts a lot of pressure on employees as a lot of power washing must be done in little time.

“With our production system, a lot must be done in a short period of time. Power washing takes up time and has always been a dreaded task”, says Brian Bremner, Director of Production and Innovation.

Before getting a robotic power washer, they used to get a custom wash crew to do the job. But with changing biosecurity protocols and the risk of bringing outside disease onto the farm this was no longer a viable option.

“In the past, we did get a custom wash crew in, but that is neither cost-effective nor in line with our high standards for biosecurity“.

For this reason, the progressive group started searching for an alternative solution. Based on good references from other production groups across North America, they decided on getting the ProCleaner X100 wash robot from Washpower. From here, it was a smooth process. They reached out to Washpower’s trusted dealer in Canada, Happy Farmer, that had the unit in stock and ready to ship.

When the unit arrived, Washpower came on-site to introduce the machine and help dial it in. The setup of a washing robot from Washpower is easy, as the robot comes programmed from the factory, so only slight tweaking of the settings is needed to optimize for the layout of the farm.

“We were very impressed with the service and the first day of washing our barn manager Abe really got the hang of it and he loves not having to do so much strenuous power washing”.

In the future, the group is looking into upgrading their pressure washers, so they can use both nozzles at the same time. This will allow them to wash crates on both sides of the alley simultaneously – saving them even more time. With one nozzle operation, the robot automatically switches arms between using the left and right nozzle.

“The wash robot has released staff for more important tasks like caring for animals and we can load the sows quicker into the farrowing rooms. With the implementation of the unit, we have improved our production economy and biosecurity, by not needing to use the wash crews anymore.”

With the successful first implementation, the group is now looking forward to implementing the Washpower ProCleaner X100 across more farms.