Dairy chit chat II

alps wrote: »

Went away for a week...just after doing a run around to see how grass is...

Phuq...The relief man must have left the sun switched on full time....

Drought???,Grand soft rain here Saturday
Night ,be in trouble if it didn't come

Mooooo wrote: »

Drought coming to an end by look of forecast

Rest of the country will have to suffer for enough rain to land here get us out of trouble ha.

Keepgrowing wrote: »

Is there a good forecast? I haven't looked but rain would be nice as we're blanket spreading 18/6/12 today.

Giddy up

hopefully, getting a bit crispy

Mooooo wrote:

Drought coming to an end by look of forecast

Fcuk big day this week

Those few drops of rain have been bypassing us completely.. growth in the low 20s, place getting fairly brown.. hope we get this rain that they're on about tomorrow, getting sick of feeding out bales

Grass has been surging around here (north galway) last few weeks cows swimming in grass could easily manage without rain for another couple of weeks but looks like plenty on the way

Mooooo wrote: »

Fcuk me some thunderstorm here power gone lightning every few minutes will be some tracks thru the reseeded fields in morning with rain

Moo...hope you send some northwards...counting the seconds..at 35..must be 6/7 miles away, but no rain yet...fingers and toes crossed....

Mooooo wrote: »

It was heading east., all the rain id say ran off the ground and into drains., 6 inch gutters couldn't hold it. Calm now again rain stopped Just back from outfarm checking calves all still there anyway. Mobile mast hit as no coverage

You're a rain God alright.

Gawddawggonnit wrote: »

Ambulance here at 6am to a suspected heart attack. 58yr old smoker...

You or your father ? Hope all well

Does anyone have any thoughts on the Teagasc FETAC level 5,6,7 etc. programmes as an alternative to leaving cert?

Seriously thinking of letting the boy apply to go to Gurteen in the Autumn instead of doing his last year of LC - if he stays at his boarding school he's going to get results way short of what he is capable of and all he wants to do is work & farm anyway. He could go to a tutorial college if he wants but he would prefer - he says, and we think - to work his way right through the farming degrees in a pure ag. environment.

He's young (not yet 17) and bright but having never attended a traditional school of any kind until secondary school here he doesn't think much of the setup and I think I agree with him that Leaving Cert. won't do him justice. What he wants to do - and I'd be happy for him if he could - is end up with a serious dairy management degree but via a vocational route with plenty of worthwhile placements, perhaps with a couple of years in the UK or elsewhere to finish off. He works more or less full time anyway for a Contractor and seems to thrive at anything he does, at least judging by the feedback I get from farms he is at.

Obviously Leaving Cert is the more traditional approach especially if he eventually wants to move outside agriculture - but leaving the risks of not doing that aside - what do people think of the Teagasc route and Gurteen Level 5 in particular?

K.G. wrote: »

While not the question you asked ,tell him do the leaving.while he might never use it in his life time school isnt all about a peice.of paper.this day and age not doing it raises an eyebrow on cvs in a situation where its the first contact.father died when i going imto fifth and my mother battled to keep me in school but i would thank her now for social and mental reasons. Lastly he ll be working long enough

Yeah.. that was my first response as well, unfortunately (as he pointed out) by the time I was his age I was already working on the Stock Exchange floor and, again correctly, he could if he wished go to tutorial college to do LC or A levels at some later point.

What I don't want him to do is return to school to get poor leaving cert. results and end up - by default - doing a short course at ag. college and then going straight to work - I'm looking at the FETAC approach as a vocational path right through to a full degree, albeit that it will almost certainly need to be in agriculture or something closely related. Oddly enough I see this route as giving him the longest and most comprehensive education possible.

Take your point though!