Teagasc / Dawn 100Cow-1 Man Suckler Farm

_Brian

http://www.agriland.ie/farming-news/teagasc-says-its-new-100-cow-suckler-farm-in-the-west-will-be-a-one-man-operation/

Was reading this article on Agriland.
It will be interesting to see how the numbers stack up..

They are sourcing all cows and future replacments from dairy herds, AAx/HEx
100 Cows on 138 Acres, finishing stock on farm.

No word if the enterprise will carry a SFP to keep the income up ?? Nor if they are including land purchase cost of the current building renovations into the books.

Nettleman

I sure they will be paying full farmer rates for fertilser, meal vets and machinery too

rushvalley

_Brian wrote: »

http://www.agriland.ie/farming-news/teagasc-says-its-new-100-cow-suckler-farm-in-the-west-will-be-a-one-man-operation/

Was reading this article on Agriland.
It will be interesting to see how the numbers stack up..

They are sourcing all cows and future replacments from dairy herds, AAx/HEx
100 Cows on 138 Acres, finishing stock on farm.

No word if the enterprise will carry a SFP to keep the income up ?? Nor if they are including land purchase cost of the current building renovations into the books.

Setting up a demo farm on some of the best land in the country to show west coast suckler farmers how to improve their farm makes sense.....

Limestone Cowboy

rushvalley wrote: »

Setting up a demo farm on some of the best land in the country to show west coast suckler farmers how to improve their farm makes sense.....

Exactly my thoughts, would have been some merit in it if they did it back west Clare in not so free draining land.

MF290

Maybe I'm a bit cynical but as soon as I see Dawn involvement or Glanbia or any other companies for that matter, all I can think of is them trying to see how little the farmers can work for.

rangler1

MF290 wrote: »

Maybe I'm a bit cynical but as soon as I see Dawn involvement or Glanbia or any other companies for that matter, all I can think of is them trying to see how little the farmers can work for.

They don't need help from teagasc to do that.
Fair dues to them for putting money into it, there used to be lots of little demonstration farms around the country run by ACOT (1980s teagsac iykwim) and they were very interesting and usually run by one person

patsy_mccabe

Ah c'mon rangler ACOT, you're giving your age away. Do you remember when FAS was ANCO? I do.:p

Greengrass1

rushvalley wrote: »

Setting up a demo farm on some of the best land in the country to show west coast suckler farmers how to improve their farm makes sense.....

No matter where the farm if it's not managed right you may aswell be on a bog somewhere with a few cows.
I know mattew the lad that will be running it.
One field only grew 2.2t last yr. Farm cover this spring waa only 200.

Milked out

Greengrass1 wrote: »

No matter where the farm if it's not managed right you may aswell be on a bog somewhere with a few cows.
I know mattew the lad that will be running it.
One field only grew 2.2t last yr. Farm cover this spring waa only 200.

In fairness gg a lot of suckler farms are on wetter areas of the country so a farm in those areas would be of more benefit to the majority. Obviously managment is key but night and day can be the difference in working environments on wet and dry farms. Practice early turnout on wet demonstration farms instead of going to a farm walk on dry demonstration farms telling you to let the cows out 1st of Feb cos they can

Greengrass1

Milked out wrote: »

In fairness gg a lot of suckler farms are on wetter areas of the country so a farm in those areas would be of more benefit to the majority. Obviously managment is key but night and day can be the difference in working environments on wet and dry farms. Practice early turnout on wet demonstration farms instead of going to a farm walk on dry demonstration farms telling you to let the cows out 1st of Feb cos they can

would they get a 120ac farm of wetter type soil in say mayo or clare? Are they not generally smaller farms there?
It'll have to be a full time job. They can't do a part time one, that's just immediately putting a nail in the coffin saying no one can make money full time at sucklers

_Brian

Greengrass1 wrote: »

would they get a 120ac farm of wetter type soil in say mayo or clare? Are they not generally smaller farms there?
It'll have to be a full time job. They can't do a part time one, that's just immediately putting a nail in the coffin saying no one can make money full time at sucklers

I suppose there are many ways to look at it..
Isn't the current land they have is in 3 blocks so they haven't got one 120 acre holding anyway.. Any area will have 3 40 acre blocks for sale..

But if anything wouldn't any of us choose to farm on better land, and small numbers of lads do sell their holdings to move onto better farms.. maybe that alone is a lesson to take on board for anyone wanting a fulltime operation, it takes good land !!

Timmaay

_Brian wrote: »

I suppose there are many ways to look at it..
Isn't the current land they have is in 3 blocks so they haven't got one 120 acre holding anyway.. Any area will have 3 40 acre blocks for sale..

But if anything wouldn't any of us choose to farm on better land, and small numbers of lads do sell their holdings to move onto better farms.. maybe that alone is a lesson to take on board for anyone wanting a fulltime operation, it takes good land !!

Ah here, its hard enough to make a full time living on marginal land that you inherited, not to mind having to go out and buy the bloody land :P

rangler1

patsy_mccabe wrote: »

Ah c'mon rangler ACOT, you're giving your age away. Do you remember when FAS was ANCO? I do.:p

had you money borrowed when interest rates went from 10% to 20%+....these young uns don't know they're born

mayota

patsy_mccabe wrote: »

Ah c'mon rangler ACOT, you're giving your age away. Do you remember when FAS was ANCO? I do.:p

What's FAS ?

patsy_mccabe

mayota wrote: »

What's FAS ?

I didn't know they renamed it until today when I looked up what year ANCO became FAS. It was 1988 by the way.

Mad4simmental

rangler1 wrote: »

had you money borrowed when interest rates went from 10% to 20%+....these young uns don't know they're born

At least you could make a living back then. No easy mony any more. Every industry has the producer squeezed out to the max and not just the agri sector.

You could buy ten times the amount of land back then for the same amount of money, so naby the expensive money the ould lads keep going on about actually wasn't that expensive was it?

rangler1

Mad4simmental wrote: »

At least you could make a living back then. No easy mony any more. Every industry has the producer squeezed out to the max and not just the agri sector.

You could buy ten times the amount of land back then for the same amount of money, so naby the expensive money the ould lads keep going on about actually wasn't that expensive was it?

How do you make that out, a lot of farmers got into difficulty in the early eighties, loans and overdrafts at 10 - 20% isn't sustainable, it was probably worse for farming than this recession, alright if you didn't need to borrow, I saw armchair farmers get 25% per annum on money that they had from selling cattle and didn't need until they restocked in the spring.
We bought land in 1974 at £800/acre and bought a new car for 800 as well, so it's all relative I suppose.
Beef/sheep farming was never easy to make a living at, I know the good subsidies of the nineties straightened out a lot of loans here

Miname

Good land or bad land it's another step in the right direction. You won't please everyone, and I'd class it as average ground.

_Brian

Miname wrote: »

Good land or bad land it's another step in the right direction. You won't please everyone, and I'd class it as average ground.

Fair enough point..

And considering their cow choice I don't think they are just stacking everything in their favor either.

It will be interesting to see it develop and even more interesting to see the financial reporting..

blue5000

AFAIK the cows are angus x from the dairy herd. I think it would be interesting to have a closed herd and breed their own replacements. Maybe they will do this when they find the better cows in the herd.

With 100 cows it should be doable anyway. Getting good quality replacements from the dairy herd is only going to be harder in future as Jersey breeding increases.

I don't see what the problem is with having Dawn meats involved. It might help them realize that fixed costs have to be covered by the beef price too. Only issue I'd have is research centres are soft sellers to the factories.

jfh

Any open days planned?

Carrigogunnell

We're is it lads.

tanko

Carrigogunnell wrote: »

We're is it lads.

Athenry, Galway.

rangler1

blue5000 wrote: »

AFAIK the cows are angus x from the dairy herd. I think it would be interesting to have a closed herd and breed their own replacements. Maybe they will do this when they find the better cows in the herd.

With 100 cows it should be doable anyway. Getting good quality replacements from the dairy herd is only going to be harder in future as Jersey breeding increases.

I don't see what the problem is with having Dawn meats involved. It might help them realize that fixed costs have to be covered by the beef price too. Only issue I'd have is research centres are soft sellers to the factories.

They won't be selling enough to affect the market

blue5000

rangler1 wrote: »

They won't be selling enough to affect the market

No, but have you ever tried selling bulls the same week Grange was throwing 80 bulls at the same factory as you were trying to sell a load?

tomieen jones

Why have they gone for angus x ? I know labour saving but they won't get to the same weights finishing? What type bull these angus cross cows going to?

rangler1

blue5000 wrote: »

No, but have you ever tried selling bulls the same week Grange was throwing 80 bulls at the same factory as you were trying to sell a load?

No, but trying to sell a few cattle when dairy farmers are clearing out in January must come close

Bullocks

tomieen jones wrote: »

Why have they gone for angus x ? I know labour saving but they won't get to the same weights finishing? What type bull these angus cross cows going to?

It's probably the most likely breed of replacement we will be able to get from a dairy farmer .
I suppose they will breed them to different bulls to see what works but if it was me I would start them on an easy calved limo and see how they are in the first year . If they give trouble calving cull them when the calf is reared and they are fattened and if they are able for it go with a charlaois after that to get a good lump of a calf .
I wonder do they even need to go for a charlaois if they are not looking for big carcass weights anyhow

blue5000

tomieen jones wrote: »

Why have they gone for angus x ? I know labour saving but they won't get to the same weights finishing? What type bull these angus cross cows going to?

AFAIK charolais, probably easy lim as heifers.

patsy_mccabe

Miname wrote: »

Good land or bad land it's another step in the right direction. You won't please everyone, and I'd class it as average ground.

Average in Athenry?

Limestone Cowboy

patsy_mccabe wrote: »

Average in Athenry?

Might be average compared to a lot of the land further east of it but it's like comparing night and day to a lot of the land further west of it.

Bullocks

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

Might be average compared to a lot of the land further east of it but it's like comparing night and day to a lot of the land further west of it.

I'm working out Athenry way lately and a lad was showing me a bit of "mountain "as he called it that they only eat in a good summer . 20 miles west of it there would be lads draining and spraying rushes and trying silage on it because it would be flat enough to travel on

Limestone Cowboy

Bullocks wrote: »

I'm working out Athenry way lately and a lad was showing me a bit of "mountain "as he called it that they only eat in a good summer . 20 miles west of it there would be lads draining and spraying rushes and trying silage on it because it would be flat enough to travel on

I'm kinda in the balance here myself, 6 or 7 miles north of me there are lads doing tillage and have cows out to grass in early February with no fear of poaching on really good land. If I went the same distance south west of me you have 6-7 months of cattle in sheds and a constant battle with rushes and keeping land drained and you could travel 40 miles in that direction until you run out of land and it's the same story all the way.

Bullocks

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

I'm kinda in the balance here myself, 6 or 7 miles north of me there are lads doing tillage and have cows out to grass in early February with no fear of poaching on really good land. If I went the same distance south west of me you have 6-7 months of cattle in sheds and a constant battle with rushes and keeping land drained and you could travel 40 miles in that direction until you run out of land and it's the same story all the way.

I think your balanced a bit better LC ! Winterage that's better than any shed and will keep you a fit as a mountain goat going to check on them !
The sucklers in Athenry probably won't be anywhere near you for cost of production.
Will they be very heavily stocked at 100 cows plus finishing everything plus replacements or will they buy those as springers ?
Hope they give weights and estimates of selling them as weanlings compared to finishing

Miname

patsy_mccabe wrote: »

Average in Athenry?

yes average, its not louth nor leitrim. every ground has its own issues. to be fair, all lads are doing is nit picking, i hear the same muck about sure hes far better ground or i couldnt get them out as early as him; these are always the cries out of lads from lads in our btap group to farmers standing around the ring to my own father who reckoned we were maxed out years ago, im stocked at 2.5 times what he had and i'll be at three times by this time next year. these farms that are puttig everything out there are there for us to learn from, there arent two identical farms in the country so every farmer will have to try and utilise what info is there in such a way as to make it relevant to their own farm, why not let soil type be just another factor to allow for.

fanmanad

On our visit there they gave us a good bit of info. Dont rem all of it but they were using Blonde and Limo bulls on them but were open to trying any breed. Bulls were chosen on their traits especially calving ease. Most of the cows calved on their own which would be a must for a one man operation. Replacements were being bought as calves and served at 15 months. Oh and the first field we went into was about 20 acres so def not typical west of Ireland!