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Beef price tracker 2

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Comments

  • Registered Users Posts: 2,111 ✭✭✭DBK1


    You don’t bother with sheds, slurry, esb, a tractor and loader with a few implements, diesel and maintenance for said tractor, dosing cattle, insurance etc. etc?



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,745 ✭✭✭Jjameson


    Theyre a good big bale of dry silage Bass. A middling bale that’d keep 25 cattle for the day is worth 40 since mid summer here. You’d need 50€ I think. Cattle on silage alone are growing a doing yes but bone and frame doesn’t weigh.

    Id have €2.00 a day in mind for a store here. I’d hope they’re doing .5 a day.. And I suspect I’m persuading myself I’m at anything, a few forward warmer lads getting a bit of barley ration at €440 a tonne, (6kg has them north of €4 a day) The extra kilo of gain is wiping their arse I think.



  • Registered Users Posts: 557 ✭✭✭Fine Day


    I am on a similar boat Bass. 55 heifers (dairy white heads, Angus and limousines) getting approx 4kgs of beef finisher each per day. All in all they are getting about 9 bale's of may cut silage a week. Meal is costing me currently €430/ton blown in. Hope to be getting some off later in the month or early February. At €37/bale 9 bale's is costing me €333 per week or 86cent per day per animal. Meal is costing me €1.72 on top of it so over all feed cost is @€2.58 per head per day. My first year at this, am I mad??? I am on week 5 on the meal.



  • Registered Users Posts: 3,394 ✭✭✭kk.man


    Bass will have his own take on it but IMO with the way cattle is rising every week despite higher costs i think there will be a margin for the WF.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,537 ✭✭✭Cavanjack


    Those heifers are heading for €6 a kg. You should do alright out of them if they were bought anyway right. Have someone keep an eye on them if you are not experienced as they can go over fat easy.



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  • Registered Users Posts: 18,013 ✭✭✭✭Bass Reeves


    I am not selling or buying it. That is what it cost me to make it and ya they are good bales probably a tad too dry for finishing but stores are flying on them.

    We were discussing the cost of overwintering compared to finishing. If anything fixed coats are higher on a finishing system.

    Fixed costs are very low in the scale of things. My shed is completely deprecated. It would hold 100+ stores. But I usually have 60 ISH in it. Most shed build to grant specifications will have a 50 year lifespan. 12-13/ head before depreciation 7-8 after deprecation per year.

    On a system like mine tractor work is very low cost. If the tractor is on for longer than 10 minutes any day during the winter it's the exception during the week. Was in and out of the yard n twenty five-thirty minutes today.

    Again dosing etc will be applicable whether you are finishing or storing over the winter.

    Slava Ukrainii



  • Registered Users Posts: 936 ✭✭✭trabpc


    I'm with you. Finishing 52 wh and AAX heifers at moment. Got 12 off early Dec at flat rate of €5. Like you looking at costs... ADG live weight is c.1kg so 0.5 kg dead wt per day. At 5.20 is only €2.60 a day... Like you was feeding 9 bales week to them.but since ive increased barley i noticed the bale usage dropped. At 3kg head day at moment and agent wants me to double it.. (works out at €1.14 per head per day @ Barley €380/T) silage i value at €35 so another €1.12 a day. So costing €2.30 day to keep as is..... no diesel, time ,esb etc included.

    Don't think it will pay . even at €5.30/kg. Got caught with WH before going over fat.

    They averaging 530kg now so hope to kill remaining 40 in early Feb.

    Only advice I can give with AAX and W/H is get a flat price. And forget the grid, as good few will grade O-, O= so will incur -24 on the grid. Even with Angus bonus and Bord bia they struggle to make it up to base

    Rarely get any off before winter but got 6 this year in Sep,but were feb born. Unless dairy breeds are Jan or early Feb born not a chance they be finished before 2nd winter

    Least organic payments helps. Without that I wouldn't bother.



  • Registered Users Posts: 18,013 ✭✭✭✭Bass Reeves


    They ate a long way from it locally for a small producer. Neighbour got quoted 5/kg for bullocks last Friday off two local factories. I say heifers are 10c/kg ahead of that. An AA is 15c/kg bonus before Christmas if you only had one or two in a load.

    At them prices an O+AA heifer would be 5.33/kg. They will haul feedlot cattle from 70-80 miles away before they pay more locally. Transport any distance is 20/head now if you go to 70-80 miles it's 28/head and they are loaded at 6pm. On a 265kg heifer that is 10.5c/kg. Take away 1% bodyweight for that at least that is another 5c/kg.

    That means you need 20c/kg extra to travel for to have 12-13 euro/beast extra out of it.

    Cattle coming fit now are being fed 12+ weeks heifers maybe a tad less. You are still.only breaking even over feed costs. Any profit is banked from the grass last summer.

    It will take March or maybe later to break 5.5/kg base. You are talking about 120-150/head margin on heifers at that stage if they are not gone over fat.

    Traditional breed heifers of all cattle they will go fat on the smell of grass during April and May. 2-3kgs if barley/maize/hull for 4-5weeks from early May. Price will probably be 50c/kg better than now and 20c/kg better than March.

    The way I look at it now for the smaller drystock farmer it's a matter of gauging your stock to your farm size. What you sell off grass leaves the most margin with the least work

    Slava Ukrainii



  • Registered Users Posts: 557 ✭✭✭Fine Day


    We all have different views. My thinking is cattle prices will peak before May. Alot of cattle will start coming fit off the Grass from May on and that may let the factories do what they always do when they have a good supply. That inturn will put a good demand on buying back in young replacement stock.



  • Registered Users Posts: 4,139 ✭✭✭Robson99


    Which in turn will get the finishing man burned at some stage. Costs are too high at present. More money to be made when inputs are low.... less chance of getting burned



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  • Registered Users Posts: 1,285 ✭✭✭Anto_Meath


    Was talking to an agent today, for AAx heifers he said the factory is offering €5.15, plus 20 cent QA and the 30 cent AA bonus. Wouldn't be a bad twist.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,745 ✭✭✭Jjameson


    That was never the case. Grass is worth money now and it’s the one things the cartel can’t replicate.



  • Registered Users Posts: 1,025 ✭✭✭DukeCaboom


    Sounds good. Was €5:50 all in down here last week for polly heifers.



  • Registered Users Posts: 18,013 ✭✭✭✭Bass Reeves


    That is it in a nutshell. An animal slaughtered over the winter has to have the margin banked in since coming off grass.

    The real question is with margin so low in winter finishing is why you would consider it of you have other options.

    Producing excess beef off ration is actually competing against our selves. Processors will always have a need for winter finished beef.....they just will not pay us to produce it until we stop doing it for free

    Slava Ukrainii



  • Registered Users Posts: 4,139 ✭✭✭Robson99


    Cost of producing grass and Silage is crazy at present. Hard to make money at any system when fertiliser is €1000 a ton and Silage €35-40 a bale to make.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,537 ✭✭✭Cavanjack




  • Registered Users Posts: 2,745 ✭✭✭Jjameson


    extensive low input farming is profitable, like no other time in my life. Which has a two pronged effect, reduced output, less product, better price.

    The hardest medicine to take is always the best for you!



  • Posts: 0 [Deleted User]


    That’s gas. Reduced output guarantees higher price. Might work if you are opec.

    Gas prices are on the slide. Hopefully fertiliser prices will follow, however, fertiliser companies tend to buy there gas ahead of time.

    Maybe lads will shift from winter finishing to contract rearing combined with a few of the environment schemes



  • Registered Users Posts: 5,085 ✭✭✭Grueller


    Any time I ever saw cattle dear, they were scarce. There is no guarantee but there is a correlation. If it was analysed by any data analytics company I am sure they would agree.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,745 ✭✭✭Jjameson


    And cheaper fertilizer is cheaper for everyone, you won’t be one cent better off and a whole lot worse off. output increases, grain,beef and milk price falls. Extensive farming nor intensive farming now works.

    Has it escaped your attention that every farm enterprise has actually shown profit in these times of high input prices.

    There’s no shortage of winter finishers and there won’t be.



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  • Posts: 0 [Deleted User]


    Beef prices are high while supply is low. As soon as all these 30 month old cattle hit the market in mid summer then the price generally falls.

    The winter finishers supposedly need €6 a kilo. I don’t know how long more they can manage. Maybe some are getting stock away late in the year at say 20 months.



  • Posts: 0 [Deleted User]


    Not getting your point here. If your point is you have to be a better farmer than your average farmer then that’s obvious.



  • Registered Users Posts: 884 ✭✭✭leoch


    Foyle meats in donegal down to 4 day kill from this week



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,745 ✭✭✭Jjameson


    cheap oil, cheap fert, and cheap grain has never resulted in improved beef farm incomes. The polar opposite is the case. And at no time is the better farmer or as we know him in north Wexford “the smart hoors” at more of an advantage as when both input and output prices are high.

    chasing crows over long distances for small spuds is no use if spuds are cheap.



  • Registered Users Posts: 285 ✭✭smallbeef


    Cheaper gas is bad news for the average Irish farmer. We are getting high output prices because the high input model of agriculture is suffering with the high costs. Once the input like fert, diesel, feed go down the output prices will plummet again.

    I have a much higher margin with fert at 1000/t and feed and 500/t and beef at €5.20/kg than fert at 350/t, feed at 250/t and beef at €3.60/kg because I am not intensive and am grass based. Feedlots will clean-up again when inputs go back down.

    Irish farmers have an edge in times of high input costs (provided that is the case globally) so I don't understand all the praying fert etc will drop to the floor.



  • Registered Users Posts: 515 ✭✭✭1373



    Is it a lack of supplies or a way to panic suppliers



  • Posts: 0 [Deleted User]


    The reality is that if you can keep your inputs down then you won’t be as vulnerable to input cost fluctuations and will be able to benefit more when farm gate prices rise.



  • Posts: 0 [Deleted User]


    Prices only went that low at the peak of the pandemic and it was more associated with collapse in demand rather than low input prices



  • Registered Users Posts: 13,095 ✭✭✭✭Danzy


    Have to agree on inputs being cheaper, that only helps the feed lot operation.


    The margin in beef is increasingly going to be either a handy few Bob from extensive grass based or intensive lot based and high volume low margin per head. If inputs drop it will just accelerate the move towards feed lots.


    Feed lots must be coming up on a quarter of the kill now.


    That's only going to increase,


    The cartel are going to be reluctant to pay a price that's viable no matter the situation, at least grass fed have a chance to minimize cost, 500 cattle in Sheds A waiting to be fed is more challenging.


    I can think of a lad locally who has a mini feed lot, 600 a year finished. I don't include the likes of him in the feed lot future, he is tomorrow's small farmer being squeezed out by the big fella, he knows it too, it will be a good few years probably but the trend is there.



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  • Registered Users Posts: 285 ✭✭smallbeef


    Prices went lower during pandemic. Prices were very rarely above €4 anytime from 2016-20.



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