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

mahoney_j

stanflt wrote: »

My bull is still in and will be in for another few weeks

I know you may think it's wrong but I ain't letting cows go out the gate empty

You'd be surprised the money that may and June calvers fetch- always a market in Northern Ireland or UK

I sell most of the late calvers but very few cows leave her empty- 6-7%including deaths but in reality my breeding season is long

Don't get me wrong All the heifers will calf jan - early March as 6 week calving rate is critical for milk solids maximisation

Feel free to criticise

Your correct re late calvers and northern buyers ,there suckers for them and at a good price too as long as there milky stock though .if I were in winter milk I'd adopt same policy but spring milk for now and no room for passengers

WheatenBriar

stanflt wrote: »

My bull is still in and will be in for another few weeks



Feel free to criticise

I won't because you winter milk
Obviously if you dried in November it would be stupid
So its stupid to most people

If you can justify winter milk (Post quota era thats those who supply in December and January) Whats wrong with calving in may and june,now theres no quota?
June to june contains the same number of months as march to march and clearly it will be a small percentage of the herd

Greengrass1

WheatenBriar wrote: »

I won't because you winter milk
Obviously if you dried in November it would be stupid
So its stupid to most people

If you can justify winter milk (Post quota era thats those who supply in December and January) Whats wrong with calving in may and june,now theres no quota?
June to june contains the same number of months as march to march and clearly it will be a small percentage of the herd

Cause it's a PIA and I won't have it !
Two seperate blocks. Your either incalf or your not. Wrecked my head having a few to dry off this wk and a few calving next wk and I couldn't get in the calving zone or the breeding zone and your at that ****e for 8 mths of the yr.

frazzledhome

stanflt wrote: »

My bull is still in and will be in for another few weeks

I know you may think it's wrong but I ain't letting cows go out the gate empty

You'd be surprised the money that may and June calvers fetch- always a market in Northern Ireland or UK

I sell most of the late calvers but very few cows leave her empty- 6-7%including deaths but in reality my breeding season is long

Don't get me wrong All the heifers will calf jan - early March as 6 week calving rate is critical for milk solids maximisation

Feel free to criticise

Won't criticise yet, need a question answered first.

Do you calve these cows or sell in calf?

stanflt

frazzledhome wrote: »

Won't criticise yet, need a question answered first.

Do you calve these cows or sell in calf?

Calve them unless buyer wants them before calving-

WheatenBriar

Greengrass1 wrote: »

Cause it's a PIA and I won't have it !
Two seperate blocks. Your either incalf or your not. Wrecked my head having a few to dry off this wk and a few calving next wk and I couldn't get in the calving zone or the breeding zone and your at that ****e for 8 mths of the yr.

It doesn't bother me,milks milk
What does bother me is what I said in the milk price thread and will be a continuing theme of my posts unless theres a miracle and/or whelan2 becomes Taoiseach and minister for Agriculture and finance...

Panch18

WheatenBriar wrote: »

I won't because you winter milk
Obviously if you dried in November it would be stupid
So its stupid to most people

If you can justify winter milk (Post quota era thats those who supply in December and January) Whats wrong with calving in may and june,now theres no quota?
June to june contains the same number of months as march to march and clearly it will be a small percentage of the herd

Well a June calves cow is neither a winter Milker or a spring Milker

She's going to grass when the quality is starting to go from it and she's getting stale by the time a winter feed diet is introduced

Panch18

stanflt wrote: »

My bull is still in and will be in for another few weeks

I know you may think it's wrong but I ain't letting cows go out the gate empty

You'd be surprised the money that may and June calvers fetch- always a market in Northern Ireland or UK

I sell most of the late calvers but very few cows leave her empty- 6-7%including deaths but in reality my breeding season is long

Don't get me wrong All the heifers will calf jan - early March as 6 week calving rate is critical for milk solids maximisation

Feel free to criticise

Well it's all only opinion and every man can do what he wants

Buts it's interesting you're selling these cows!!!!

Deepsouthwest

If buying in anything I'd buy incalf heifers right now and let them acclimatise before they calve nxt spring. Bought in a bunch of heifers on the point of calving from a v genuine seller this spring, and they just worked out for me at all. There hasn't been a wk when some one of them hasn't been off form and back in milk for some reason or other. One of them going to dairy yesterday and another with red water this morning, typifies them!

Wildsurfer

stanflt wrote: »

My bull is still in and will be in for another few weeks

I know you may think it's wrong but I ain't letting cows go out the gate empty

You'd be surprised the money that may and June calvers fetch- always a market in Northern Ireland or UK

I sell most of the late calvers but very few cows leave her empty- 6-7%including deaths but in reality my breeding season is long

Don't get me wrong All the heifers will calf jan - early March as 6 week calving rate is critical for milk solids maximisation

Feel free to criticise

You can make Dairy farming as easy or as complicated as you like but if you prefer to keep things simple then block calving is essential. On this farm if a cow is not in calf in 12 weeks she is out the gate regardless of EBI or yield. It's all about focusing your energy on specific tasks over a specific time period. 10-12 week calving, then time for a break and re focus on 12 week breeding period. Maximise your stocking rate for the main growing season and get rid of empties to extend grazing into nov/dec then dry. Then time for a break. And with all calves born before April no need to split groups for extra feeding etc. No need for new tractors with shiny Tubs and load alls and more time for other things in life than milking cows 365

Greengrass1

Time of the yr to go on dg tour.
Any suggestions. Pm if you want don't want farmers names thrown around here

mahoney_j

Greengrass1 wrote: »

Time of the yr to go on dg tour.
Any suggestions. Pm if you want don't want farmers names thrown around here

Trip up to Meath would be nice .2 places of particular interest to me would be wood town jerseys and that stanfit lad !!!!

Greengrass1

mahoney_j wrote: »

Trip up to Meath would be nice .2 places of particular interest to me would be wood town jerseys and that stanfit lad !!!!

One lad mentioned robots the last day. Reckon all in group would like to see them in action too so maybe them lads that mikk 300 cows through them

Bullocks

Greengrass1 wrote: »

One lad mentioned robots the last day. Reckon all in group would like to see them in action too so maybe them lads that mikk 300 cows through them

Are they in Meath with a second name beginning with "F" ?

Greengrass1

Bullocks wrote: »

Are they in Meath with a second name beginning with "F" ?

Not sure of there names tbh. Think there up meath direction

the_blue_oval

just been reading some articles on milking OAD full-time.. anyone here doing it/did it in the past?

if its as good as theyre making it out to be in this articles, why isnt it more popular? is it that people arent willing to take the financial hit in the first year or two? or is it all just mindset?

frazzledhome

the_blue_oval wrote: »

just been reading some articles on milking OAD full-time.. anyone here doing it/did it in the past?

if its as good as theyre making it out to be in this articles, why isnt it more popular? is it that people arent willing to take the financial hit in the first year or two? or is it all just mindset?

I just can't see the saving. I know people who do in spring with heifers till breeding to get weight on them.

The feed is the same the fixed costs are the same, the yield of ms is lower. With the investment here I can't see it interesting me too much

the_blue_oval

frazzledhome wrote: »

I just can't see the saving. I know people who do in spring with heifers till breeding to get weight on them.

The feed is the same the fixed costs are the same, the yield of ms is lower. With the investment here I can't see it interesting me too much

less labour, lower replacement rate, lower feed costs for winter as bcs is better, more lactations/cow, better fertility/more compact calving, higher stocking rate, less lameness, less meal fed to reach similar solids and of course lifestyle are some of the advantages they are giving.

only stumbled across the idea recently, im planning on coming home to farm full time at some stage in the future and its a system id be very interested in.. reckon i could carry ~250-300 cows on oad on the home block as it is..

only 20years of age and not finished college yet so plenty time to research/experience it and other systems!

just wanted to put it up here to see if anyone had any experience of it or looked into doing it before.. suppose ill be called a lazy youngfella for thinking of oad milking but anyway

Greengrass1

the_blue_oval wrote: »

less labour, lower replacement rate, lower feed costs for winter as bcs is better, more lactations/cow, better fertility/more compact calving, higher stocking rate, less lameness, less meal fed to reach similar solids and of course lifestyle are some of the advantages they are giving.

only stumbled across the idea recently, im planning on coming home to farm full time at some stage in the future and its a system id be very interested in.. reckon i could carry ~250-300 cows on oad on the home block as it is..

only 20years of age and not finished college yet so plenty time to research/experience it and other systems!

just wanted to put it up here to see if anyone had any experience of it or looked into doing it before.. suppose ill be called a lazy youngfella for thinking of oad milking but anyway

If ye want to milk that many oad I wouldn't call you lazy.
The fact of loosing slot of good cows in first yrs would turn me off. If I anyone was to do it you would need to start with heifers so there used to it

stretch film

A 15% increase in solids over a lot of cows would pay for alot of relief milking.

Timmaay

There was a decent article in the IFJ afew weeks ago about a chap who switched over to OAD full time. He was very happy with the setup, but the change was not without its problems, a good few cows were just not suited to OAD, high SCC etc, so as a result he had a very high cull rate 1st few years. If your thinking about expanding to 250 cows or so then 2bh you will need to minimize the cull rate. I'd tend to agree with stretch, find out what sort of relief milkers are available local to you, both in the FRS and outside of it, have 2 or 3 lads who know your parlour well, and you will always be able to get one of them when you need them. I've had an ag college friend do a decent bit of milking over the summer, I'd happily get the likes of that again and probably give them a set 6milkings over the week etc, ya got to remember also in fairness milking isn't that hard a job, once you have everything fairly well laid out (plenty of instructions, clear rules etc), then training someone up to milk should be no harder than training a McDonalds staff member!

whelan2

Timmaay wrote: »

There was a decent article in the IFJ afew weeks ago about a chap who switched over to OAD full time. He was very happy with the setup, but the change was not without its problems, a good few cows were just not suited to OAD, high SCC etc, so as a result he had a very high cull rate 1st few years. If your thinking about expanding to 250 cows or so then 2bh you will need to minimize the cull rate. I'd tend to agree with stretch, find out what sort of relief milkers are available local to you, both in the FRS and outside of it, have 2 or 3 lads who know your parlour well, and you will always be able to get one of them when you need them. I've had an ag college friend do a decent bit of milking over the summer, I'd happily get the likes of that again and probably give them a set 6milkings over the week etc, ya got to remember also in fairness milking isn't that hard a job, once you have everything fairly well laid out (plenty of instructions, clear rules etc), then training someone up to milk should be no harder than training a McDonalds staff member!

agree on the training bit, but its the attention to detail thats most important, spotting a sick cow or one in heat etc

WheatenBriar

whelan2 wrote: »

agree on the training bit, but its the attention to detail thats most important, spotting a sick cow or one in heat etc

This.
Though it can be done

frazzledhome

Timmaay wrote: »

Scanned the heifers and rest of the cows today. Didn't go well! Anyways after updating ICBF with both days of scanning, 37 feb calvers, 19 March, 20 April, and 20 either empty or too soon to tell. 9 of them 20 empties are pushing on and I'll cull them definitely, don't know what the fcuk to do with the rest, 6 are 1st lactation and 4 2nd lactation, one heifer also, but she was too small in fairness. Afew cows incalf that I really need to cull also, 2bh I'll end up with a cull rate of 25 or 30% this year at least.

You have 3 options IMO.

1. Cull now or at end of season and replace

2 Leave bull in and have June calvers

3 Remove bull and continue to milk them, run them as winter milkers and use stock bull to in Dec.

No 1 won't work as your Dad isn't in favour and there's no point raising people's blood pressure. Only pick fights you can win

No 2 isn't really an option as your calving on the thick of AI and rearing calves till mid Aug. Stan can do as he has really milky cow for NI/UK market. I really wouldn't be in favour of this.

No 3 will maintain cash flow and keep stock in the system till you've the heifer numbers on the ground that'll free you to cull selectively. I'd use a beef bull on winter ladies in order not to keep heifers from stock bulls.

Regardless of what you read this is one of the main tools used by most to keep numbers up while expanding

jaymla627

Timmaay wrote: »

There was a decent article in the IFJ afew weeks ago about a chap who switched over to OAD full time. He was very happy with the setup, but the change was not without its problems, a good few cows were just not suited to OAD, high SCC etc, so as a result he had a very high cull rate 1st few years. If your thinking about expanding to 250 cows or so then 2bh you will need to minimize the cull rate. I'd tend to agree with stretch, find out what sort of relief milkers are available local to you, both in the FRS and outside of it, have 2 or 3 lads who know your parlour well, and you will always be able to get one of them when you need them. I've had an ag college friend do a decent bit of milking over the summer, I'd happily get the likes of that again and probably give them a set 6milkings over the week etc, ya got to remember also in fairness milking isn't that hard a job, once you have everything fairly well laid out (plenty of instructions, clear rules etc), then training someone up to milk should be no harder than training a McDonalds staff member!

The thing with a macdonalds staff member is if the manager pops out for a hour our two the whole show stops and sweet f-all gets done, tyred to train a young lad up the road into the parlour last week he apparently was well able to milk etc etc....
turned out to be a disaster, usually takes a hour to milk from machine on to off, was taking this lad nearly 15 minutes to do a row, showed him the proper way to cup the cows etc explained to him he had to be quicker cause of over - milking etc...
Still got no better, the final straw was when I copped him on the phone in the parlour not a care in the world with 6 cows milked out and clusters ready to fall of them...
A good relief milker is a rare thing nowadays and they're only going to get more scarce going forward

Buford T. Justice XIX

jaymla627 wrote: »

The thing with a macdonalds staff member is if the manager pops out for a hour our two the whole show stops and sweet f-all gets done, tyred to train a young lad up the road into the parlour last week he apparently was well able to milk etc etc....
turned out to be a disaster, usually takes a hour to milk from machine on to off, was taking this lad nearly 15 minutes to do a row, showed him the proper way to cup the cows etc explained to him he had to be quicker cause of over - milking etc...
Still got no better, the final straw was when I copped him on the phone in the parlour not a care in the world with 6 cows milked out and clusters ready to fall of them...
A good relief milker is a rare thing nowadays and they're only going to get more scarce going forward

That's a generational thing, Jay.

I had my nephew (15) milking with me last week. Every time he heard a beep from his phone, out it came to check what it was and then a message sent back off. The cows definately weren't in the top ten things on his mind:rolleyes:

frazzledhome

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

That's a generational thing, Jay.

I had my nephew (15) milking with me last week. Every time he heard a beep from his phone, out it came to check what it was and then a message sent back off. The cows definately weren't in the top ten things on his mind:rolleyes:

Solution, phone and car keys left at front of bulk tank. Two things achieved no needless phone play and tank cooler gets checked at end if milking. Phone isn't far away if person needs to call some one. That rule has been here for some time now

My oldest lad 10yo can cup 10 cows while I'd do 16 so no excuse for that pricking around. He has to use a 20 litre can in order to reach feeder handles

Buford T. Justice XIX

the_blue_oval wrote: »

less labour, lower replacement rate, lower feed costs for winter as bcs is better, more lactations/cow, better fertility/more compact calving, higher stocking rate, less lameness, less meal fed to reach similar solids and of course lifestyle are some of the advantages they are giving.

only stumbled across the idea recently, im planning on coming home to farm full time at some stage in the future and its a system id be very interested in.. reckon i could carry ~250-300 cows on oad on the home block as it is..

only 20years of age and not finished college yet so plenty time to research/experience it and other systems!

just wanted to put it up here to see if anyone had any experience of it or looked into doing it before.. suppose ill be called a lazy youngfella for thinking of oad milking but anyway

I would say to use LIC bulls for a good few years before going OAD. They have the bulls scored on which ones will be better for OAD and i would breed heavily with those ones till they make up most of the herd before i would go OAD as I reckon those bull will reduce the wastage from cows unsuitable for OAD.

If you are going up to those numbers then you will be looking at at least 2 fulltime on the farm and a parttime milker and, as stretchfilm said, a 15% increase would pay for an awful lot of relief milking on a herd that size.

Buford T. Justice XIX

frazzledhome wrote: »

Solution, phone and car keys left at front of bulk tank. Two things achieved no needless phone play and tank cooler gets checked at end if milking. Phone isn't far away if person needs to call some one. That rule has been here for some time now

My oldest lad 10yo can cup 10 cows while I'd do 16 so no excuse for that pricking around

That's a good plan, frazzled.

The same lad is the diesel head in his family, the second lad is the cow man.

Milking with a teenager was a disturbing glimpse into my future, though:o

whelan2

frazzledhome wrote: »

Solution, phone and car keys left at front of bulk tank. Two things achieved no needless phone play and tank cooler gets checked at end if milking. Phone isn't far away if person needs to call some one. That rule has been here for some time now

My oldest lad 10yo can cup 10 cows while I'd do 16 so no excuse for that pricking around. He has to use a 20 litre can in order to reach feeder handles

My phone is on top of the in plate cooler at the top of the parlour, kids will ring me if the need me. There's no internet coverage in parlour. Eldest lad has an iphone 6 and this is never ever brought out to the yard.