Dairy Chit Chat- Please read Mod note in post #1

tanko

jack o shea wrote: »

Lads can pneumonia spread from cow to cow? Had one with it last week got her in time got vet out she seems OK now but this morning there was another cow off her meal in the parlour and looking slack,gave her 50 ml of almycin and put her in on straw bed.

It can spread through a shed of weanlings like wildfire so i don't see why dairy cows would be any different especially at this time of year when they're indoors and under pressure.

pedigree 6

jack o shea wrote: »

Lads can pneumonia spread from cow to cow? Had one with it last week got her in time got vet out she seems OK now but this morning there was another cow off her meal in the parlour and looking slack,gave her 50 ml of almycin and put her in on straw bed.

Could be IBR basically pneumonia. Have you vaccinated for IBR with live vaccine? Vaccinated stock can spread IBR to non vaccinated stock so best to keep groups separate or vaccinate everything on the same day. That's not to say they can't pick up IBR elsewhere. Given the choice it's always best to vaccinate.

keep going

Had to go into town today and was stunned at the number of herds out grazing and ploughing.whats the panic, the grass isnt going to get a head of anyone and you could see fellas feeding silage dry days yet the way things are going because av farm covers are crashing

pedigree 6

keep going wrote: »

Had to go into town today and was stunned at the number of herds out grazing and ploughing.whats the panic, the grass isnt going to get a head of anyone and you could see fellas feeding silage dry days yet the way things are going because av farm covers are crashing

There should be no panic ground is going to dry up now. No point tearing up ground for the sake of a few days. There giving a prolonged dry spell now and everyones cows will be out now and growth will be taking off. I tore up half a paddock and i'll have to spread grass seed on it and roll when it dries but I wouldn't want to be doing that to whole farm. The cows are in today here as all dry ground is grazed but should be out tomorrow on the damper ground with the drying out today.

jack o shea

Never had to vaccinate for ibr before maybe I will have to now, how long does it take to work? Milk withdrawl time?What time of year do most lads do it?

whelan2

jack o shea wrote: »

Never had to vaccinate for ibr before maybe I will have to now, how long does it take to work? Milk withdrawl time?What time of year do most lads do it?

No milk withdrawal. Best thing I ever did was to vaccinate. Do them every 6 months

whelan2

pedigree 6 wrote: »

There should be no panic ground is going to dry up now. No point tearing up ground for the sake of a few days. There giving a prolonged dry spell now and everyones cows will be out now and growth will be taking off. I tore up half a paddock and i'll have to spread grass seed on it and roll when it dries but I wouldn't want to be doing that to whole farm. The cows are in today here as all dry ground is grazed but should be out tomorrow on the damper ground with the drying out today.

Lads get too tied up with target dates and percentages grazed. Grand in a normal year but this spring is in no way normal. Was out there cleaning out drinkers ground is alot drier than i thought.

mahoney_j

whelan2 wrote: »

Lads get too tied up with target dates and percentages grazed. Grand in a normal year but this spring is in no way normal. Was out there cleaning out drinkers ground is alot drier than i thought.

Even more cruical to meet targets this year Imo,loads of grass around ,cruical to get 30% grazed before March 1 for a srart ,those that are still housed and waiting for things to get ideal will be near guaranteed to be short of grass throughout April and they will be basically grazing full farm on short rotation with shorter recovery time till round 2 starts .just about hit 30% here and with slurry and urea out regrowths are improving by the day .most challenging February and March I rember ,made use of all tools I could like on/off ,multiple gaps etc .nowhere ploughed bar one gap .all the nights out with flash lamp bringing in cows will soon be forgotten .saying that I fully accept some people on heavy waterlogged land just couldn't release stock .really good dry land around here (well in most years anyway)and very few had cows out at all for last few weeks bar this fool !!!!,they may of laughed at me with my flash lamp but I think I'll be laughing back through April at them with little grass and still feeding silage .......

pedigree 6

jack o shea wrote: »

Never had to vaccinate for ibr before maybe I will have to now, how long does it take to work? Milk withdrawl time?What time of year do most lads do it?

Talk to your vet he/she should advise you.
But up until a few years ago I never vaccinated either.
Then one of my replacement heifers got it while grazing aftergrass beside a neighbours cattle. He was after vaccinating 10 days or so beforehand and she picked it up that way. People will say that's nonsence but if you read the warnings on the live vaccine it tells you it is a live vaccine and can spread for a certain time after administering it.

If starting off vaccinating you have to give the live vaccine for a few years and that lasts for six months so twice a year and then you can go to a dead vaccine but only to the cows, youngstock will have to start on the live/six month vaccine.
I never bothered going to the dead vaccine as the live six month one gives more protection to all stock.

Not sure if i'm right or wrong but I give in march and October and there's no milk withdrawal period.

I can say this since I started vaccinating for ibr and lepto the fertility of the herd has improved and minerals helps as well.

whelan2

mahoney_j wrote: »

Even more cruical to meet targets this year Imo,loads of grass around ,cruical to get 30% grazed before March 1 for a srart ,those that are still housed and waiting for things to get ideal will be near guaranteed to be short of grass throughout April and they will be basically grazing full farm on short rotation with shorter recovery time till round 2 starts .just about hit 30% here and with slurry and urea out regrowths are improving by the day .most challenging February and March I rember ,made use of all tools I could like on/off ,multiple gaps etc .nowhere ploughed bar one gap .all the nights out with flash lamp bringing in cows will soon be forgotten .saying that I fully accept some people on heavy waterlogged land just couldn't release stock .really good dry land around here (well in most years anyway)and very few had cows out at all for last few weeks bar this fool !!!!,they may of laughed at me with my flash lamp but I think I'll be laughing back through April at them with little grass and still feeding silage .......

Fair enough but my point is on wet land these targets can not be met. All we can do is do our best with what we have

mahoney_j

whelan2 wrote: »

Fair enough but my point is on wet land these targets can not be met. All we can do is do our best with what we have

Fully agree ,

Base price

orm0nd wrote: »

feeder teats too high up, or faulty / incorrect teats

use an acidifer/gut enhanser with powder

cut out the hay, straw alone is much better

Feeders are at the same levels as other years. Teats are not faulty.
Vet phoned yesterday to see how the calves were getting on and suggested adding a teaspoon of Stimulex powder to the milk replacer/yoghurt mix or glucose/yoghurt mix or dosing same to the sick calves.
I have always offered both hay and straw to young calves.
I can't figure out how one or two calves per pen are affected today yet the rest are ok. A couple of days later another calf would bloat
Out of 7 pens which are divided between 3 different sheds (1 shed is in a different yard) only one pen of calves has not been affected.
All calves are dosed with Bovicox and vaccinated with Rispoval intranasal within a day of arrival.

Panch18

mahoney_j wrote: »

Even more cruical to meet targets this year Imo,loads of grass around ,cruical to get 30% grazed before March 1 for a srart ,those that are still housed and waiting for things to get ideal will be near guaranteed to be short of grass throughout April and they will be basically grazing full farm on short rotation with shorter recovery time till round 2 starts .just about hit 30% here and with slurry and urea out regrowths are improving by the day .most challenging February and March I rember ,made use of all tools I could like on/off ,multiple gaps etc .nowhere ploughed bar one gap .all the nights out with flash lamp bringing in cows will soon be forgotten .saying that I fully accept some people on heavy waterlogged land just couldn't release stock .really good dry land around here (well in most years anyway)and very few had cows out at all for last few weeks bar this fool !!!!,they may of laughed at me with my flash lamp but I think I'll be laughing back through April at them with little grass and still feeding silage .......

why will the lads who don't hit the 30% target be running out of grass in April?

mahoney_j

Panch18 wrote: »

why will the lads who don't hit the 30% target be running out of grass in April?

If you've 30% grazed by March 1 that ground has much longer to grow and recover for srart of second round in early April .by not hitting the 30% and releasing big nos in early mid March ground will be grazed too quick with less recovery time and thus the need to be buffering in silage throughout April waiting for growth to catch up .there will also be a hit on what u can grow in whole year and unless you've top notch silage /maize yields and solids will suffer .also a lot more meal to be fed .

pedigree 6

Base price wrote: »

Feeders are at the same levels as other years. Teats are not faulty.
Vet phoned yesterday to see how the calves were getting on and suggested adding a teaspoon of Stimulex powder to the milk replacer/yoghurt mix or glucose/yoghurt mix or dosing same to the sick calves.
I have always offered both hay and straw to young calves.
I can't figure out how one or two calves per pen are affected today yet the rest are ok. A couple of days later another calf would bloat
Out of 7 pens which are divided between 3 different sheds (1 shed is in a different yard) only one pen of calves has not been affected.
All calves are dosed with Bovicox and vaccinated with Rispoval intranasal within a day of arrival.

It sounds like the milk powder or yoghurt is to blame. There's something going on anyway. Not sure if you mentioned what brand of milk powder you're using but you're going to have to say what it is to see if anyone else is having problems. Maybe you're not supposed to mix that powder with yoghurt or maybe the yoghurt is to blame. Maybe you might be better off starting all over again with a new milk replacer/ yoghurt mix culture.

Panch18

mahoney_j wrote: »

If you've 30% grazed by March 1 that ground has much longer to grow and recover for srart of second round in early April .by not hitting the 30% and releasing big nos in early mid March ground will be grazed too quick with less recovery time and thus the need to be buffering in silage throughout April waiting for growth to catch up .there will also be a hit on what u can grow in whole year and unless you've top notch silage /maize yields and solids will suffer .also a lot more meal to be fed .

I would suggest that ground that is damaged now due to overly ambitious grazing would run you out of grass faster than now having it grazed at all

Ground damaged now will take a fair while to recover, grow less in the next round and possibly grow less over the entire season as a result

farmerjj

Panch18 wrote: »

I would suggest that ground that is damaged now due to overly ambitious grazing would run you out of grass faster than now having it grazed at all

Ground damaged now will take a fair while to recover, grow less in the next round and possibly grow less over the entire season as a result

+1 no point in damaging ground just to meet a target,calender farming does not work in the long term, it was the 8th of march when I left cows out last year and we didn't run out of grass in April. There would be a few farmers who could leave cows out this month and then that's great but most ground is still 2heavy

Dawggone

Had an open day here today. Went well, bar the couple of lads that (I reckon) didn't believe our nitrogen usage on grass and forage maize. Truth is that I do massage the nitrate usage, but I underuse on dairy to use on high protein wheats!
The 50+mm that we were to get last night didn't materialize, we only got 28mm and it was dry today albeit a bit blustery. Cows were out today even though the general consensus was that it was crazy to have animals out.

Interestingly I did a count of how many of them had robots...just 2 out of 61. They were very conscious of CoP. Nothing like poor prices to sharpen the mind.

RightTurnClyde

Panch18 wrote: »

I would suggest that ground that is damaged now due to overly ambitious grazing would run you out of grass faster than now having it grazed at all

Ground damaged now will take a fair while to recover, grow less in the next round and possibly grow less over the entire season as a result

I think that's MJs point, if ground could take it and if it was managed, there is no doubt about the advantages to getting grass grazed in February and March. Obviously there are a lot of parts of the country that could not be grazed in Feb and March any year, let alone this year.
You need to balance between what's better for the plant or the ground. Grass is a lot more resilient this time of the year than you might imagine. Any grass grazed here over Feb and March is starting to motor here. Anything not grazed, heavy covers are sitting there doing nothing and some heavy covers are even decreasing. That's a lost opportunity and can only be replaced with silage or meals. Money lost. The ground grazed here is marked but as MJ said the grazing was managed, on/off, multiple gaps, when conditions allowed, small blocks of time at a time. If ground is right for it and if managed there is only so much damage cows can do in 3-4 hours grazing and then they're gone. They're not poaching.
For me where the real issue will be is if it is still wet on the second round and cows are going into ground that has already been tested in Spring, then there'll be damage done, but as of now on this farm the pros well out weigh the cons.

mahoney_j

RightTurnClyde wrote: »

I think that's MJs point, if ground could take it and if it was managed, there is no doubt about the advantages to getting grass grazed in February and March. Obviously there are a lot of parts of the country that could not be grazed in Feb and March any year, let alone this year.
You need to balance between what's better for the plant or the ground. Grass is a lot more resilient this time of the year than you might imagine. Any grass grazed here over Feb and March is starting to motor here. Anything not grazed, heavy covers are sitting there doing nothing and some heavy covers are even decreasing. That's a lost opportunity and can only be replaced with silage or meals. Money lost. The ground grazed here is marked but as MJ said the grazing was managed, on/off, multiple gaps, when conditions allowed, small blocks of time at a time. If ground is right for it and if managed there is only so much damage cows can do in 3-4 hours grazing and then they're gone. They're not poaching.
For me where the real issue will be is if it is still wet on the second round and cows are going into ground that has already been tested in Spring, then there'll be damage done, but as of now on this farm the pros well out weigh the cons.

Good points there Clyde ,def not advocating damaging ground or poaching but am advocating grazing within reason without destroying the place .nothing destroyed or damaged beyond hitting growth for rest of year here bar one gap .anything marked has good growth back up and run of roller and it'll be bang on .i will say one thing I don't want same conditions going back into those paddocks in April as if marked again there will def be a knock on effect for year

Dawggone

The new finance package for dairy farmers launched today (€100m), facilitated by Glanbia...anyone know the details?

keep going

What covers are on the ground that will be regrazed first week in april, lots of 100 and 200s on early grazed ground around here which would mean growth rates of 40 plus for the next 3 weeks

RightTurnClyde

Dawggone wrote: »

The new finance package for dairy farmers launched today (€100m), facilitated by Glanbia...anyone know the details?

There used to be a lad around these parts that would have had all the ins and outs, but he's gone and fcuked off. Never around when you need him. And when you didn't want him sure as hell ...

whelan2

RightTurnClyde wrote: »

There used to be a lad around these parts that would have had all the ins and outs, but he's gone and fcuked off. Never around when you need him. And when you didn't want him sure as hell ...

If we stir enough about it he might be back

Buford T. Justice XIX

Dawggone wrote: »

The new finance package for dairy farmers launched today (€100m), facilitated by Glanbia...anyone know the details?

This is all I know about it so far, Dawg...

http://www.farmersjournal.ie/glanbia-launches-100m-milkflex-loans-scheme-202809/

Milked out

Had the first couple of lic calves landed yday. A big wds bull calf of a wuh cow and 2 kjt heifers. Decent size calves. Kjt mainly black wds mainly white. May get a few straws in for earlier in the season, anyone using lic straws and what would ye recommend? They seem daughter proven in nz but ebi reliability is low enough. Thinking of using them on more hol cows but would want to bring as much milk as possible at the same time. As some of the hol have size but not as milky as their size would suggest.

Dawggone

RightTurnClyde wrote: »

There used to be a lad around these parts that would have had all the ins and outs, but he's gone and fcuked off. Never around when you need him. And when you didn't want him sure as hell ...

True.

Buford T. Justice XIX

RightTurnClyde wrote: »

There used to be a lad around these parts that would have had all the ins and outs, but he's gone and fcuked off. Never around when you need him. And when you didn't want him sure as hell ...

I've had my run ins with Frazzled but he was an excellent contributor here and will be missed.

Hopefully he will be back soon.

whelan2

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

This is all I know about it so far, Dawg...

http://www.farmersjournal.ie/glanbia-launches-100m-milkflex-loans-scheme-202809/

You must have your msa signed to get the loan. I have spoken to a few who will be leaving Glanbia when the current msa runs out so loan is of no use to them. Think its another tool to try and keep farmers with glanbia.

Milked out

whelan2 wrote: »

You must have your msa signed to get the loan. I have spoken to a few who will be leaving Glanbia when the current msa runs out so loan is of no use to them. Think its another tool to try and keep farmers with glanbia.

What are the interest rates?