BETTER farm walks

Dozer1

Anyone go to the BETTER farm walk in Sixmilebridge yesterday or any of the other ones for that matter, meant to try and get there but got distracted elsewhere.

Any useful information there?

Muckit

I was going to go to that one, but went to Willie Fox's teagasc farm walk in Glasson, Athlone instead on Tuesday (nearer to me). He's not in BETTER farm prog as far as I know, but he is an excellent farmer with good stock nonetheless.

They had some of his his cows and calves seperated in bunches in temp elec fence pens in the field and also his farm bred replacement heifers. Sorry I didn't bring the camera:o

Willie (farmer) gave a few words, a lad from P Genetics (guy that bought Cottage Devon in Carrick), Livestock exporter from Mullingar (david Garvalley?/Garavallio?) and Katherine O'Leary from intervet gave a talk on herd health,IBR, BVD etc)

It was well attended and I found it very informative. I find if you bring ONE thing away from a day/evening like that, it's well worth the trip.

Muckit

The exporter lad gave a great talk on what he expected when looking for cattle. To my surprise he wasn't overly keen on the BB. According to himself, the BB breed has a different blood type to charolais/Blonde/Part. This blood type can, for some reason, cause dark cutting meat at slaughter. It doesn't happen in all BB, but can happen with no obvious trend or reason for it. The same effect can occurr in any cattle that are stressed pre slaughter, either in transit or in the meat plant itself.

Although it doesn't effect meat quality,the meat has a dark look to it. And as he said himself when the housewife goes into the butchers, she will opt for pinky red meat instead, thinking it's fresher.

This particular exporter is looking for animals over the 350kg, well muscled and with potential, ie with growthy frame. He reckoned Irish cattle were excellent. They are all mainly crossbred, which gives us the advantage over France etc and their PB's, as they will have good feet that will hold up well when pushed in the itailian feedlot.

He didn't like overly 'hairy' animals either, perferring animals with a tight pelt. As he said himself, 'you can't eat it!'

Another interesting stat, cattle will lose 8% bodyweight in the time it takes to ship from the mart, until they arrive in the destination country. They have to factor this in when they buy. Overly fat/pampered calves will obviously loose the most, that's why he wouldn't go for them. If he did, he'd be offering less to compensate

Algeria is another country he exports to.

reilig

Muckit wrote: »

The exporter lad gave a great talk on what he expected when looking for cattle. To my surprise he wasn't overly keen on the BB. According to himself, the BB breed has a different blood type to charolais/Blonde/Part. This blood type can, for some reason, cause dark cutting meat at slaughter. It doesn't happen in all BB, but can happen with no obvious trend or reason for it. The same effect can occurr in any cattle that are stressed pre slaughter, either in transit or in the meat plant itself.

Although it doesn't effect meat quality,the meat has a dark look to it. And as he said himself when the housewife goes into the butchers, she will opt for pinky red meat instead, thinking it's fresher.

This particular exporter is looking for animals over the 350kg, well muscled and with potential, ie with growthy frame. He reckoned Irish cattle were excellent. They are all mainly crossbred, which gives us the advantage over France etc and their PB's, as they will have good feet that will hold up well when pushed in the itailian feedlot.

He didn't like overly 'hairy' animals either, perferring animals with a tight pelt. As he said himself, 'you can't eat it!'

Another interesting stat, cattle will lose 8% bodyweight in the time it takes to ship from the mart, until they arrive in the destination country. They have to factor this in when they buy. Overly fat/pampered calves will obviously loose the most, that's why he wouldn't go for them. If he did, he'd be offering less to compensate

Algeria is another country he exports to.

A lot of BB's sold in this country last year went to the uk.

On the flip side of what yer man says, there is obviously a market for elsewhere (Spain is 1 market that loves our BB's) for the BB's cause they still command higher prices per kg than other breeds.

Its good to have a buyer like that talking to farmers on the ground. At least they will kow what to produce and how to produce it.

pakalasa

Then again, yoy may have an exporter who has a foot in one market and not in the other. I think the different countries ssem to favour the type of beef that has tradionally been produced locally.

Any opinions on the farm itself (in sixmilebridge)? Not a hundred miles from myself.:D

Here's the video link;
http://www.farmersjournal.ie/farming/farming-videos/player/index.php?cc=2&cv=91

snowman707

didn't go to SMB but might head to Ennis to morrow night, any one know what's on display or otherwise happening there ?

vanderbadger

snowman707 wrote: »

didn't go to SMB but might head to Ennis to morrow night, any one know what's on display or otherwise happening there ?

is that the limousin society thing at the mart? half heard an add on radio abou it, what time does that kick off snowman?

snowman707

vanderbadger wrote: »

is that the limousin society thing at the mart? half heard an add on radio abou it, what time does that kick off snowman?

7.00 pm

pakalasa

Clare Limousin Club Field Evening Ennis Mart Friday August 12th
Speakers from Teagasc, AI Companies and The Irish Limousin Society. Topics “Achieving a Calf per Cow per Year” and “Breeding with a Commercial Focus”. Event will include a Free Draw for AI Straws and a display of pedigree and commercial cattle.

From;
http://www.irishlimousin.com/html/clare_club.html

Might be worth a look.

vanderbadger

pakalasa wrote: »

Then again, yoy may have an exporter who has a foot in one market and not in the other. I think the different countries ssem to favour the type of beef that has tradionally been produced locally.

Any opinions on the farm itself (in sixmilebridge)? Not a hundred miles from myself.:D

Here's the video link;
http://www.farmersjournal.ie/farming/farming-videos/player/index.php?cc=2&cv=91

watched that video, was hoping to see his cows and calves more that the bulls he was finishing..i watched a few more of the videos as well and they all (the farmers)seems to have totally rejigged their system in about 2 years..compact calving down etc..pinch of salt as you say yourself :rolleyes:

redzerologhlen

vanderbadger wrote: »

watched that video, was hoping to see his cows and calves more that the bulls he was finishing..i watched a few more of the videos as well and they all (the farmers)seems to have totally rejigged their system in about 2 years..compact calving down etc..pinch of salt as you say yourself :rolleyes:

I did my 3 months placement for the green cert with him 3 years ago just before he went into the better farm program, He was only after getting out of dairying the year before that so he had paddocks in place and he has really good quality free draining land. He is a serious operator to give him his due. The principals of the better farm program are pretty simple too, Get as much cheap gain from grass as possible, Get cattle out to grass early, Have the farm properly stocked, Tighten up your calving interval and have a fairly uniform bunch of calves. It takes a lot of dicipline to do these things but at the end of the day is it a hobby or a business??

vanderbadger

redzerologhlen wrote: »

I did my 3 months placement for the green cert with him 3 years ago just before he went into the better farm program, He was only after getting out of dairying the year before that so he had paddocks in place and he has really good quality free draining land. He is a serious operator to give him his due. The principals of the better farm program are pretty simple too, Get as much cheap gain from grass as possible, Get cattle out to grass early, Have the farm properly stocked, Tighten up your calving interval and have a fairly uniform bunch of calves. It takes a lot of dicipline to do these things but at the end of the day is it a hobby or a business??

why did he get out of the dairying

redzerologhlen

vanderbadger wrote: »

why did he get out of the dairying

I think the price of milk was bad that year and he was buying calves for shippers and hes a one man outfit with over 100 cows and followers. I assume all those things were a factor in it. It must have been a fairly snap decision too because he had a 10 unit dairymaster parlour with automatic feeders and it was only a few years old. Its a big investment to have left sitting idle like.

Muckit

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3tkiGow59g&feature=related

This is the youtube video link of the DVD that PG were giving out on the farm walk I mentioned above. It's a good watch. That Italian exporter I mentioned is in it, as is Joe Murray, one of the 16 BETTER farm participants.

Oh .........and Justin fans don't be sad......... he starrs in it too!

vanderbadger

Muckit wrote: »

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3tkiGow59g&feature=related

This is the youtube video link of the DVD that PG were giving out on the farm walk I mentioned above. It's a good watch. That Italian exporter I mentioned is in it, as is Joe Murray, one of the 16 BETTER farm participants.

Oh .........and Justin fans don't be sad......... he starrs in it too!

I think the leg wax posted this up before
good video

Muckit

A few pics I took the other evening. Some nice cattle and excellent grassland management

Muckit

some more of the bull weanlings...

Muckit

creep gate

flatout11

good looking calves, he must still be using a fair bit of AI

Muckit

All charolais by his new stock bull Roughan Danny. As far as I know from going around to the PB charolais Sales, he's a breeder from that part of the country (lifford, Co. Donegal). Always gets top money for his bulls and you can see why from the quality of the CH calves here
http://www.icbf.ie/taurus/bull_search/index.php?search_type=name&search=roughan+danny

Muckit

All paddocks (~15) are divisioned with sheep wire and two rows of barbed. Serious amount of gates hung as you can imagine, and all with these clips to stop them being opened by stock

Muckit

flatout11 wrote: »

good looking calves, he must still be using a fair bit of AI

Ya the first few cows were AI'ed with blue straws before being let out of the shed.

I was well impressed with the grass. As thick as a carpet and it was all grass, I mean NO weeds... no soft weeds, no docks. He's a big fan of mixed grazing, keeping a small flock of sheep. I'd say they had alot to do with keeping a quality sward.

He goes out 2 weeks after silage with knapsack and nips any dock as it comes up. Reckons too much blanket spraying with the tractor sprayer is setting back the grass too much. More power to him. What he's achieving is a credit to him. He does admit though it is good quality land

flatout11

what were the cows like? they seem a mixture from the pics

Muckit

flatout11 wrote: »

what were the cows like? they seem a mixture from the pics

Nothing to write home about really. A mix of breeds, no allegance to any one breed, mostly LM, CH and SIM crosses. All bought in. 3 things he looked for in a cow 'Milk, milk and milk' ... and a calf every year.

Muckit

Anyone hear of any BETTER farm walks organised for this year?? I emailed J Mc last back end to see if they had anything organised for this spring, but got no reply!

Is this the last year of the programme?

Muckit

Bump :cool: