Most appropriate milk production system in Ireland

Cultie

Given all the talk, hype and hysteria over early turnout, low cost spring calving systems it is ironic that the journal on page 34 shows winter milk to be the most profitable.

Not only are winter milk producers achieving a better margin per cow but also carrying more cows per hectare.

Is it time to realise that we have to take the biggest risk out of farming in Ireland - the weather.

Reading the greenfield article it look looks to me that they are flogging a dead horse year after year just and killing the selfs in the process.

House the cows, make lots of silage ( which be way better utilises grass) and leave the job easier for man and animal.

The New Zealand men are also realising this now.

Up north they haven't had a quota problem for years and they have found a 7500 litre autumn winter calving herd to be the most profitable and easiest managed year on year.

Is it time for a reality check on trying to do what the kiwis used to do in the 90's and early naughty's and learn from the neighbours up north.

Gillespy

I think somewhere in the middle works well.

Timmaay

Gillespy wrote: »

I think somewhere in the middle works well.

Agreed, I don't think it hugely matters if you are spring only or split, the main thing at the end of the day is to maximise milk production from grass. Feeding the cow above this is dependent purely on grass deficits, ie preserving cow condition, and then the price of milk in comparison to grain/bought in fodder.

The problem with a split setup is it tends to be more labour intensive, two sets of calving blocks etc, this is why I would favourite spring only, certainly for myself, with a milking platform of 44ha, that is not my limitation yet as I only have 75cows, I'm tending towards a full spring system now, fertility will govern how soon I can achieve it. If in afew years time it made sense to increase the SR on the milking platform by going back to winter milk then I might consider it then.

sheebadog

Small land base = high input Holsteins.

Large land base = low input "cows".

st1979

sheebadog wrote: »

Small land base = high input Holsteins.

Large land base = low input "cows".

Whats a large land base. If you have 30ha you would feel a guy with 60 ha had a large land base. And plenty with 60 feel they need to be intensive due to having built up large quota. I have 50 grazeable ha and 25 not grazeable rented. Should I be intensive or extensive? ?

sheebadog

st1979 wrote: »

Whats a large land base. If you have 30ha you would feel a guy with 60 ha had a large land base. And plenty with 60 feel they need to be intensive due to having built up large quota. I have 50 grazeable ha and 25 not grazeable rented. Should I be intensive or extensive? ?

Definitely intensive. IMHO.

Sam Kade

This grazing platform does my head in, a platform is a raised level surface has feck all to do with grazing cows. It used to be called grazing area until kiwi slang words made some farmers feel more important :rolleyes:

sheebadog

Sam Kade wrote: »

This grazing platform does my head in, a platform is a raised level surface has feck all to do with grazing cows. It used to be called grazing area until kiwi slang words made some farmers feel more important :rolleyes:

Is it not IT terminology ?

st1979

Sam Kade wrote: »

This grazing platform does my head in, a platform is a raised level surface has feck all to do with grazing cows. It used to be called grazing area until kiwi slang words made some farmers feel more important :rolleyes:

Kind of agree. Hope my grazeable ha was understood by the latest kiwis and the old school.
Sheebadog I would think you are right but also would reckon my size of land area is bigger than avg. And far more typical of most southern irish dairy farms in that its got rented ground a bit away from it

Yew tree

Cultie wrote: »

Given all the talk, hype and hysteria over early turnout, low cost spring calving systems it is ironic that the journal on page 34 shows winter milk to be the most profitable.

Not only are winter milk producers achieving a better margin per cow but also carrying more cows per hectare.

Is it time to realise that we have to take the biggest risk out of farming in Ireland - the weather.

Reading the greenfield article it look looks to me that they are flogging a dead horse year after year just and killing the selfs in the process.

House the cows, make lots of silage ( which be way better utilises grass) and leave the job easier for man and animal.

The New Zealand men are also realising this now.

Up north they haven't had a quota problem for years and they have found a 7500 litre autumn winter calving herd to be the most profitable and easiest managed year on year.

Is it time for a reality check on trying to do what the kiwis used to do in the 90's and early naughty's and learn from the neighbours up north.

I completely disagree, the figures show a better margin on spring milk herds. Our only competitive advantage is our ability to grow grass cheaply. it would be very foolish to move away from system

Northern dairy farms have expanded, but are considerable less profitable than southern dairy farms, their expansion was due to unlimited quota.

st1979

Yew tree wrote: »

I completely disagree, the figures show a better margin on spring milk herds. Our only competitive advantage is our ability to grow grass cheaply. it would be very foolish to move away from system

Northern dairy farms have expanded, but are considerable less profitable than southern dairy farms, their expansion was due to unlimited quota.

Yea when i see them northern lads with there new tractors sheds parlours jeeps. I say ha look at them fools. Fools the lot of them. Then i get out my jump leads and give the old girl a shot of easy start and away i go.

I am milking for 15 years and was gullible enough to believe that these northern guys were going to go out of business due to their unprofitablility. Selling there milk into southern supermarkets at a lower price than us. Now i reckon they might know a thing or 2. They have basically had no quota for the last 15 years due to it having no value in uk. They are only up the road from us and yet we have totally different production systems. I am not saying they have it all right up there but there not fools either. What happens when you have reached max cow numbers for your grazeable land.

And is it profit per litre that you consider important.
Or total profit.

Cultie

Yew tree wrote: »

I completely disagree, the figures show a better margin on spring milk herds. Our only competitive advantage is our ability to grow grass cheaply. it would be very foolish to move away from system

Northern dairy farms have expanded, but are considerable less profitable than southern dairy farms, their expansion was due to unlimited quota.

Well take a look at the figures from profit monitor in the journal. A fairly representative sample shows winter autumn calving more profitable.

The thing is research and modelling is grand in a research institute which are mainly on dry land. In practice year on year weather messes it up. Even ballyhooed by irish standards is a dry farm. Most estates were located on dry land.

Very few New Zealanders are doing what some of these extremists here are at. Lads go out there, look at the driest farms in New Zealand and bring home a distorted message. I have been out there and I know.

The closest example of where quota realistically hasn't been an issue for years and have a similar land type is up north.

Those lads are laughing at some of the stuff in the journal re spring calving systems. I've been up there too. Granted, lots of them have heavy metal disease but that is because they make money, want to avoid tax, make things easier and buying land is not often an optional investment as you can't buy what's not for sale.

mahoney_j

Best system for me with 80 odd acres around parlour and 70 more in 3 other blocks which can't be milked off is
1 spring milk for now but once quotas go strongly considering winter milk with 2 calving blocks (early October to early December and 01 feb to 01. April

2 Holstein freisan cows producing 8 k Ltrs and over 650 kg solids using high ebi genetics

3 make full use of grass.waste none.grass measure bake surpluses and aim for 75dmd plus sage

4 stock milking block at 3.4 cows per he once cows go

5 just 3 bunches of stock on farm,milkers,maidens and heifer calves

trixi2011

Cultie wrote: »

Well take a look at the figures from profit monitor in the journal. A fairly representative sample shows winter autumn calving more profitable.

The thing is research and modelling is grand in a research institute which are mainly on dry land. In practice year on year weather messes it up. Even ballyhooed by irish standards is a dry farm. Most estates were located on dry land.

Very few New Zealanders are doing what some of these extremists here are at. Lads go out there, look at the driest farms in New Zealand and bring home a distorted message. I have been out there and I know.

The closest example of where quota realistically hasn't been an issue for years and have a similar land type is up north.

Those lads are laughing at some of the stuff in the journal re spring calving systems. I've been up there too. Granted, lots of them have heavy metal disease but that is because they make money, want to avoid tax, make things easier and buying land is not often an optional investment as you can't buy what's not for sale.

If you were to look into benchmarking figure in NI you would find that only the best are making money a lot of farms up there struggling to break even.

delaval

mahoney_j wrote: »

Best system for me with 80 odd acres around parlour and 70 more in 3 other blocks which can't be milked off is
1 spring milk for now but once quotas go strongly considering winter milk with 2 calving blocks (early October to early December and 01 feb to 01. April

2 Holstein freisan cows producing 8 k Ltrs and over 650 kg solids using high ebi genetics

3 make full use of grass.waste none.grass measure bake surpluses and aim for 75dmd plus sage

4 stock milking block at 3.4 cows per he once cows go

5 just 3 bunches of stock on farm,milkers,maidens and heifer calves

You'd be mad without a contract of some description.

You'll have more than 3 groups, 2 calved
2 Bullers and 2 cows at times

BTW I think you're far from mad!!!

mf240

Here my situation 45 acres around yard, late heavy land but great in summer,

A further 43 acres that's dry and can all be mowed, this 43 acres is in three places spread over four miles, then a further two blocks of 12 acres and 18 that are dry but steep and rocky so not mowable. That's six blocks in total.

Would 100% autumn calving be for me, or any other suggestions! I have a good milking parlour and good sheds ect.

mahoney_j

delaval wrote: »

You'd be mad without a contract of some description.

You'll have more than 3 groups, 2 calved
2 Bullers and 2 cows at times

BTW I think you're far from mad!!!

Hey sure were all mad in some way or another !!.i have put the feelers out to co op re contract and certainly won't proceed without that.the groups of stock won't present me too many problems if I stick to 2 distinct blocks and I stay breeding as I am with emphasis on fertility ,solids and ebi

kevthegaff

mf240 wrote: »

Here my situation 45 acres around yard, late heavy land but great in summer,

A further 43 acres that's dry and can all be mowed, this 43 acres is in three places spread over four miles, then a further two blocks of 12 acres and 18 that are dry but steep and rocky so not mowable. That's six blocks in total.

Would 100% autumn calving be for me, or any other suggestions! I have a good milking parlour and good sheds ect.

zero grazing??

mf240

kevthegaff wrote: »

zero grazing??

Have thought about it a few times, even had a salesman in the yard but I'm not really a machinery man, having said that I'd nearly prefer to buy a baler instead and make top quality bales on the outfarms and feed it to the milkers when needed. Thats kind of what I'm at already but with a contractor making the bales. A nice shot of meal being fed aswell, wet years do not suit me at all.

mahoney_j

kevthegaff wrote: »

zero grazing??

Not unless uvwantvto be a slave ,have high diesel bills and machinery running costs.also extra slurry to be considered

conor t

If everyone was to do winter milk it'd be spring milk that gets a bonus to keep factories tippin over during off season. The lads up the north were just limited by land that's why they are mainly high input systems-if we had a few years of low milk price would wonder how many could keep going. Don't think feeding large amounts of meal is the way to be going unless you have a very low debt level, if your expanding a lot or getting into milk imo you'd be mad to do anything other than a low cost spring calving setup

Cultie

mf240 wrote: »

Here my situation 45 acres around yard, late heavy land but great in summer,

A further 43 acres that's dry and can all be mowed, this 43 acres is in three places spread over four miles, then a further two blocks of 12 acres and 18 that are dry but steep and rocky so not mowable. That's six blocks in total.

Would 100% autumn calving be for me, or any other suggestions! I have a good milking parlour and good sheds ect.

Sometimes with fragmented land you just gotta accept that the costs of machinery diesel etc would just be too much for dairying.

Unfortunately many farmers are in a similar situation to yourself.

In fact you would even have to consider is it worthwhile farming out farms at all with cost of travel and time wasted going around the different locations.

Cultie

conor t wrote: »

If everyone was to do winter milk it'd be spring milk that gets a bonus to keep factories tippin over during off season. The lads up the north were just limited by land that's why they are mainly high input systems-if we had a few years of low milk price would wonder how many could keep going. Don't think feeding large amounts of meal is the way to be going unless you have a very low debt level, if your expanding a lot or getting into milk imo you'd be mad to do anything other than a low cost spring calving setup

Not necessarily feeding a lot of meal.

Up north on heavier land spring grazing is just not viable on a lot of heavier farms so they place a great deal on making lots of silage and very good quality stuff at that.

Often 12tonnes of silage harvested by the end of may and in the pit can be more viable than ad hoc grazing around weather with maybe only 6-7 tonnes of grass grown and eaten.

Greengrass1

st1979 wrote: »

Yea when i see them northern lads with there new tractors sheds parlours jeeps. I say ha look at them fools. Fools the lot of them. Then i get out my jump leads and give the old girl a shot of easy start and away i go.

I am milking for 15 years and was gullible enough to believe that these northern guys were going to go out of business due to their unprofitablility. Selling there milk into southern supermarkets at a lower price than us. Now i reckon they might know a thing or 2. They have basically had no quota for the last 15 years due to it having no value in uk. They are only up the road from us and yet we have totally different production systems. I am not saying they have it all right up there but there not fools either. What happens when you have reached max cow numbers for your grazeable land.

And is it profit per litre that you consider important.
Or total profit.

If you grandparents got a couple of hundred acres in one block for free would you have big shinny sheds and tractors

mahoney_j

kevthegaff wrote: »

zero grazing??

Not unless uvwantvto be a slave ,have high diesel bills and machinery running costs.also extra slurry to be considered

keep going

I tjink this thread should be renamed what isthe most appropriate system for you, different strokes for different folks, all ill say i happy out with my system improving it and tweaking it as i go.as for zero grazing, I'll give you a short cut to what you will end up at-plant the away ground with maize, wholecrop wheat or beet and forget about driving around the country and grab it in

sheebadog

For all it's worth....... I think that this expansion thing is 20 odd years a bubbling and Teagasc are giving ye a good, simple, easy formula to achieve this.

However in another 20 years ye will be milking high yielding Holsteins on AYR, and ye will be (possibly!) questioning the abolition of quotas in the first place!