Dairy Chitchat 4, an udder new thread.

straight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122832590#Comment_122832590

You can go along to the national dairy conference on Nov 27th if you want to be further patronised. All the dairy heros will be there fawning over Joe. Probably be more teagasc staff there than farmers.

limo_100

sorry posted in the wrong chit chat 🙈

the_blue_oval

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122832747#Comment_122832747

tbf he mentioned a herd feeding a ton and doing 400kg ms, and that it didn’t make sense, he said for that level of output you’d only want to be feeding more like 400kg meal or else for a ton of meal you’d want to be doing 500kg solids+. And it’s probably hard disagree with him on that.

But don’t think I know anyone feeding less than 900kg anymore, and they wouldn’t all be doing 500kg solids either!

visatorro

Maybe I misheard. I

mf240

Feed the shyte out of the cows and dont mind anyone

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mahoney_j

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122832756#Comment_122832756

love to know the reality on all those research farms ….if the shenanigans in solohead anything to go by there ain’t much credibility in any of those units

jaymla627

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122833693#Comment_122833693

Know a chap who was on the farm as part of a dairy herd management group back in September at the time 6kgs of meal plus a few kilos of palm kernel and baled silage was been feed out they had no grass...

Their a theory I reckon that after years of cutting back on N along with protected urea tying up organic n and compounds the chickens are coming home to roast on these research farms as soil reserves have now been depleted after years of the above, they won't admit to this though as it destroys their new pivot of direction re mss/clover and lower n rates been commercially viable

mahoney_j

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122833765#Comment_122833765

agree ….selling us a pup and it’s continuing ….clover and Mss only have a role on lowly stocked farms and won’t grow high tonnages …..all the prg varieties we’ve been setting last no of years are and will continue to struggle with lower nitrogen and p in particular which in many farms is a real issue as little to no allowance …..red clover for silage I have a bit of faith in but will need resetting every 3/4 years …..a lot of these advisors/experts are farming themselves …..I wonder how the reality of farming on the real world and implementing some of the crap they preach is working ……

alps

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122833765#Comment_122833765

That's the first reference to protected urea tying up organic N...can you give any details of what you know about this?

jaymla627

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122834115#Comment_122834115

Read it a while ago on another forum by another poster and it makes alot of sense

Screenshot_20241113_122642_Chrome.jpg

K.G.

Just wondering has anyone else noticed the growth and colour at the moment. I know that temps are strong to explain the growth but it dosent explain the rich colour in alot fields that havent had that colour all year

stanflt

savage cow prices in Carnaross again today

alps

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122834627#Comment_122834627

Soil Nitrogen mobilisation. It's an indication of how much N is in reserve in the Soil even though we stopped applications mid September. Great to see N utilised before winter water tables whip it away.

The unanswered question has to be, how come the Nitrogen had little impact through early to late Summer.

CasePuma

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122835500#Comment_122835500

Would we be better off grazing off covers, I'm tight on silage and could keep em out for another 2 weeks by day

Coolcormack1979

I’m grazing away.not savage covers but the cows are so content out.ground is remarkable and the bit of rain on and off since end of august has finally melted in and being used up by the grass.

Would always have stopped by November 1 and have covers left but this time I’m ignoring it.next spring can worry about itself at this stage and the lectures from Aidan Brennan and the experts

GrasstoMilk

just home from 3 days in Manchester with a discussion group

Visited 5 different farms. From multi unit autumn /spring calving to high input 12k litre herd to 350 kgs oad on the side of a hill and organic spring calving

Every farmer gave out there financials on a sheet

The biggest take home I got was each and every one was as profitable as the next. They all played to their strengths and cost control was a major part of the business. High input guy, oad guy, multi unit guy all tracked costs every quarter. Most systems were dictated by the milk buyer and what contract they could get but they all found a way to make it work

All seriously positive about their farm and all referred to it as a business and fully believed what they were doing was right for them which I think we might be lacking a bit here in Ireland.

K.G.

I think as long as you're going into decent cover.if you graze a lighter cover you run the risk the plant will not have the energy to send up the first shoot which will impact how much grass you ll have next spring

Say my name

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122836243#Comment_122836243

How is the straw situation over there and what housing had the organic farmer?

Got the accounts done here and looking at the figures. Straw cost 4200 last year, 8000 this year with me. Same amount. I just have to bite the bullet further again on housing and put in cubicles if I'm staying at cows.

GrasstoMilk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122836302#Comment_122836302

organic farmer was all straw with self fed silage. 1t of straw /cow and it’s costing 100€/t there. Cows were absolutely spotless. Tim downes. He’s on twitter

Say my name

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122836311#Comment_122836311

He's using less straw than me per cow and it's cheaper per ton.

One of ye didn't bring over Jack Kennedy's calculator and give it to him per chance. 🙄

straight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122835500#Comment_122835500

It's been answered time and time again. Too cold, too dry.

alps

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122835882#Comment_122835882

Hard to know. We have a pot of grass grown over the past 10 days when we housed the cows. We probably could have stayed out longer. It's one of those things you can't properly answer until next spring. We still have weaklings out and we may let them out on the grazing platform for a few more weeks.

alps

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122836757#Comment_122836757

I don't buy it..It's too easy an answer. It wasn't colder than temperatures we normally get in a normal April at a time we have normal growth rates of between 40 and 80. We had no worm activity. Why? No worms may have some relationship with non mobilisation of organic soil nitrogen..

straight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122836789#Comment_122836789

It was that cold northerly wind that wouldn't feck off. When it finally did stop blowing, it was too dry.

mr.stonewall

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122836789#Comment_122836789

The worms were washed outta the soil last autumn, winter and early spring. Poor soil aeration, and constant water logging of roots has to have taken it's toll on soil. Soil dried out very very quick in late May and early june. So the happy medium was not found. It was like case hardening happening. The crust of the soil crispy after being dough for so long

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122834627#Comment_122834627

During a dry warm spell N starts to rise in a gas form through the soil,when it rains ( as it did in late September tou get the benefit of it provided ground temp stay hight enough to use it. We had a similar late break in a drought was it 2022 but we got too.much rain and ground temp dropped too fast. .just the same explanation as @alps ut just explained differently.

visatorro

Anyone pricing milk powder? One downside to a good milk price is dear milk powder!

whelan2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122838227#Comment_122838227

Lad here yesterday buying calves from navan paying 47 euro a bag

Castlekeeper

I suppose we all got a text from DAFM about using bulls with a higher TB resistance index. It would put you wondering if there is any link between the recent increase in numbers and genetics.

Siamsa Sessions

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122839385#Comment_122839385

The Dept obviously think there is when they’re advising people to use particular bulls. And as ever, they’re painting it as black n’ white.

But I haven’t seen any scientific papers/articles on whether there’s a real link or not.