Spring 2020..... 1.5m Dairy calves.... discuss.

K.G.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119565200#Comment_119565200

Not going to go autumn calving but there is a logic to going to Jan 1 St start of calving.if you can get a shot of early calves away and spread the workload its worth alot.

tanko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119562608#Comment_119562608

Smug suckler farmers??????? I’ve heard it all now. Dairy farmers created this fooking problem, let them sort it out and stop blaming others for their mess ffs. Dairy farmers have lost the fooking run of themselves. There’s a boom in dairying atm, i’ve never seen a boom without a bust, we’ll see how much land dairy lads are renting then.

farawaygrass

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119565114#Comment_119565114

you struck gold with that dairy farmer. Great to see him take such an interest.

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119566110#Comment_119566110

You forget that Grueller moved from sucklers to dairying.

mr.stonewall

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119566223#Comment_119566223

His attitude is that he needs to have calves that farmers will buy year in year out. Deep down we all love to follow our own stock. Works well for both of us and we work around each other, even an odd Friesian comes back aswell. Bank transfer and movement done on the phone in the yard over a quick cuppa all done in 20-30 mins. if there is a calf I'm not gone on leave it there and see it again in 10days. Dairy farmers are not the problem, its the policy direction and blinkered view of some bodies guiding the direction of the industry.

mahoney_j

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119566110#Comment_119566110

Don’t include all is dairy farmers in that …would never consider a suckler farmer smug …same right to make a living as any one else

mr.stonewall

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119564786#Comment_119564786

If the genetic potential of calves improves it opens more doors to more buyers. What have 60% of beef farmers who have reared calves over the past 5 years at some stage, exited the rearing game. It's just bananas for that number to have exited. Some may not be cut out to rear young stock, had a bad experience of scours etc but for the majority it was simple down to poor weight for the majority leading to a poor margin. You can't make a silk purse out of a sows ear.

Secondly on the 4 suggestions I made, the head in the sand approach isn't going to help. Are beef and dairy farmers going to wait for suggestions from so called overlords in teagasc. We have to shape the direction of this to work for us. I have yet to even see a plan or a roadmap from teagasc, DAFM or any farm org on this. The best bit of policy on this is actually from Larry with his advantage scheme.

Sheep breeder

On calf quality, three local long time dairy farmers use a good Hereford, easy calving lim, easy calving char bulls and sell all the calves out of the yard and always have the same customers every year for all their calves. Another fella runs two or three scrub AAx or Hex bulls to mop up 250 cows after Ai and is always complaining no local farmer or the exporter will buy out of his yard and all calves have to go to three different marts to try sell. One dairy neighbour is doing his own Ai and will always have sim heifer calves, and now is doing saler heifer calves for sucker replacements for lads to rear. It’s all about thinking where the market is for calves.

straight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119566522#Comment_119566522

Dealing with human behaviour is never easy. If I was to suggest a possible solution it would be an Irish veal product.

mahoney_j

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119566729#Comment_119566729

Good quality calves done well will always find a home even in a tough market ….sea change of thought needed for some to accept this

minerleague

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119566729#Comment_119566729

What happens if every dairy farmer does this?

whelan2

Worst thing about selling calves out of the yard is lads giving out about price . At least at the mart you'll get what a good calf is worth. There's one lad who comes here and I just let the young lad deal with him as he'd be here hours. Other lads are in and gone and whatever price I say they pay no crap

White Clover

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119566829#Comment_119566829

True post but the change is needed pronto. I have finished a good share of dairy beef cattle over the last 10 years but not anymore. Have switched to continental cattle simply because they thrive and have decent dlwg.

Hard Knocks

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119566239#Comment_119566239

Well he hasn’t fully moved, the good prices every autumn is delaying him

mr.stonewall

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119566821#Comment_119566821

Human behaviour lends itself towards that of a flock of sheep. To move the flock, you need either a pair of dogs or a shake of nuts. Once a few are out the gap the rest will follow. Just look at the teagasc mantra and the follower on that train.

Always easier to coax with some incentive. Carrot or stick which would your prefer

mahoney_j

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119567212#Comment_119567212

The big problem I see I’ve last few years is that our dairy advice was specifically just for us ….the beef ainmal and crucially what the beef farmer willing to rear these wanted was neglected .

Lime Tree Farm

One company controls 70% of veal farm production and processing in EU.

RSPCA supervised in the UK

https://www.rspcaassured.org.uk/farm-animal-welfare/beef-cattle/what-is-veal/

not to be confused with young bonhams.

Grueller

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119566110#Comment_119566110

Not meant like that tanko. But I am sick of being told by lads, particularly when I started milking,

You will be a white slave

They'll drop the price when they have you all in

You are all destroying beef on us with your worthless calves, despite the fact that 60% of dairy cross animals are actually coming from dairy farms and 60% of slaughterings are dairy cross. So ergo 36% of all beef stock comes from dairy farms.

White oil. Highly profitable etc

Now with the first signs of storm clouds many of the lads that were saying all of this are ready to be like the stopped clock, right twice a day. They are actually in many cases taking delight in the fact but don't realise that it will collapse the beef industry before the dairy one.

Apologies for any offense caused but if you could explain where I said anyone else caused this mess I would like to have it pointed out please.

jaymla627

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119567339#Comment_119567339

Teagasc in fairness where on to something in the early days re cross-breeding when the base Irish cow had alot of holstein breeding, where the hojo first cross was a sliver bullet, to get fertility back into the Irish dairy cows but the resulting consequences on the beef side of things have really mothballed.....

It's unbelievable how small a cow you end up with when using Jersey genetics, breed a bull here of a really good spock cow (aap) to a Danish Jersey and used the resulting bull calf to clean up cows in 2020 ended up with 20 heifer calves from 25 cows he got incalf, their stunning animals re milk and type but their barely touching 400kgs live-weight as a group while the holstein bred first calvers are nearer 600kgs...

Grueller

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119567228#Comment_119567228

The father being quite attached to them is delaying me to be fair.

I got up to €4.25/kg for weanlings this year and all joking aside, I had as much profit out of well done dairy cross weanlings as I could carry 4 in the space of a cow and calf. I just fail to see the point of sucklers any more after having them for 25 years and the father 25 years before that.

straight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119567243#Comment_119567243

I wouldn't be one of the sheep. 🤣🤣

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119567425#Comment_119567425

If you have any way decent land sucklers are a waste of time. Too many lads get sucked in by the extra few euro in supports.

Ya at present dairy beef breeding is sh!te. However it's still way more profitable than sucklers. Yes you have to adapt your system. Forget about mid/ late June silage, look at a two cut system. Paddock the farm and try to get cattle out early and keep them out aso long as possible.

It all about cost control and after that it's all about .......cost control. Beef is a very unforgiving game but it's still profitable if you do it any way right.

Our biggest issue is that all Teagasc has based all there technical support on output not on profitable.

I have a dry farm I have hunkered down for the last 4-5 weeks very poor weight gain cattle starting to go over age. I need grass to grow but ,4-6 weeks grass will kill 60-70% of what I have left.

Ya this year if I had gone in with more ration 4-5 weeks ago it might have worked as well however I am gambling on the World Cup.

ginger22

The thing is any half decent cow will produce 4000 Euros worth of milk at present prices. Yet we have lads on here getting hysterical over bull calves, just because a newspaper with an agenda published an article. Get a grip. There are much more important obstacles facing farmers like the 25% emissions reduction.

mahoney_j

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119568022#Comment_119568022

Right so with exports gone and calf slaughter gone and farmers having to keep calves for 28 days what do you suggest …..industry been tarnished by caviler attitude of some to calves ……we have to think of someone else bar ourselves as dairy farmers …maby if lads were left with there jex bulls and calves of scrub bulls etc might change there mind

ginger22

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119568041#Comment_119568041

never bred jersey calves here

straight

Less cows and more milk would fix alot of our issues but it just won't be entertained. Why have 2 when 1 will do......

mr.stonewall

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119569856#Comment_119569856

Now we are talking about possible solutions. A 10% reduction in cow numbers and a 10% increase in milk volume would solve half of the export problem. Would drop the number of calvings by 90k

The option of all year round calving is for some but not the majority. Farmers need a break and some quiet time out of the parlour. This is important to recharge the body and the mind

tanko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119560243#Comment_119560243

This is where your saying others caused this mess, if the solution to the problem of dairy calves is to force farmers to get rid of sucklers then this implies that farmers with sucklers caused the problem in the first place.

Grueller

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119569965#Comment_119569965

You are putting words in my mouth. I never said anyone else caused the problem. Dairy farmers in general didn't cause the problem, the few with poor breeding did.

In my opinion the obvious solution in this piece where a herd reduction is required, the most inefficient animals are first to go. I weighed spring born dairy cross calves three weeks ago and the early February born calves weighed from 240- 270kg. How is a suckler with the same calving date, producing probably a calf only 80kgs heavier, efficient? You would keep 4 dairy crosses on the same ground.

By the way,I rear my own calves and sold continental calf feeder fed sucks for between 560 and 585 last weekend. No problem cattle there.

mahoney_j

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119569946#Comment_119569946

It is but needs looking at ..Tegasc threw all the shopping in the one basket with there advice ,kiwi model heavily promoted and we were led to believe it was the only show in town ..pat dillon to be fair admired they forgot about the extra calves ….when export goes we have a real problem and I’m seen no tangible solutions so far …