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

Muckit · 15-10-2019 10:22pm #1

https://youtu.be/pDqibPUDntA

This is the stark reality. Get the calf for free. Hope to achieve €82/hd after spending €1000 on inputs..... it's absolute madness. Madness. And they are talking about fresains.

What's going to happen when the dairy farmer cannot sell his calves next spring?

This is a disaster waiting to happen as far as l can see.

kevthegaff · 15-10-2019 10:25pm

I think you have to compare last year, things weren't that bad considering also the shipping was affected with weather. Exporters will be the key

patsy_mccabe · 15-10-2019 10:41pm

I saw 230 Kg weanling Friesian bulls sell today for €230 in Ennis. Is this the viable alternative to suckling?

15-10-2019 10:49pm

Muckit wrote: »

https://youtu.be/pDqibPUDntA

This is the stark reality. Get the calf for free. Hope to achieve €82/hd after spending €1000 on inputs..... it's absolute madness. Madness. And they are talking about fresains.

What's going to happen when the dairy farmer cannot sell his calves next spring?

This is a disaster waiting to happen as far as l can see.

Here’s what i see happening. Next spring we will looking at calves being sold for €1 and everyone saying this can’t go on, then all forgotten about in the summer and come back the following year with 1.7 million calves and be shocked again and maybe even blame the government

jaymla627 · 15-10-2019 10:52pm

kevthegaff wrote: »

I think you have to compare last year, things weren't that bad considering also the shipping was affected with weather. Exporters will be the key

Beef trade is in a hell of a worse place now then where it was at last spring, I reckon lads will simply bobby calves this year and pay the knackery to euthanise them

mf240 · 15-10-2019 11:27pm

Two tag and kebab

kk.man · 15-10-2019 11:28pm

Carnage without exports.

Sheep breeder · 15-10-2019 11:55pm

kk.man wrote: »

Carnage without exports.

How many calves can be exported or more to the point how many are wanted for export.

Base price · 16-10-2019 12:14am

Muckit wrote: »

https://youtu.be/pDqibPUDntA

This is the stark reality. Get the calf for free. Hope to achieve €82/hd after spending €1000 on inputs..... it's absolute madness. Madness. And they are talking about fresains.

What's going to happen when the dairy farmer cannot sell his calves next spring?

This is a disaster waiting to happen as far as l can see.

IMO it will be no different than any other year. It's not like it's a feckin new situation :rolleyes:

Quality dairy bull calves will ship and go for onward feeding for veal in mainland Europe. The rest will be reared by farmers or culled in DAFM approved facilitates.

Muckit · 16-10-2019 6:31am

kevthegaff wrote: »

I Exporters will be the key

1.5m = 1500,000 calves.

How many calves fit on a boat? I haven't a clue.... 1000?

What's the chances of 15 boats being chartered, let alone 1500.

Muckit · 16-10-2019 6:37am

Base price wrote: »

IMO it will be no different than any other year. It's not like it's a feckin new situation :rolleyes:

Quality dairy bull calves will ship and go for onward feeding for veal in mainland Europe. The rest will be reared by farmers or culled in DAFM approved facilitates.

Will ye rear calves to beef for €82 a head? How is that going to pay?

Of course it's a new situation. Numbers are increasing and there's nobody there to rear them.

Dairy farmers only work for a profit. They're not going to when they will lose on them and take up too much time.

Capercaillie · 16-10-2019 6:47am

Euthanize at birth. More humane than shipping young calves off on ferry.

Gawddawggonnit · 16-10-2019 6:59am

Base price wrote: »

IMO it will be no different than any other year. It's not like it's a feckin new situation :rolleyes:

Quality dairy bull calves will ship and go for onward feeding for veal in mainland Europe. The rest will be reared by farmers or culled in DAFM approved facilitates.

Time for a rethink on calves.

Who decided that veal is socially unacceptable in Ireland?
The veal industry is strong and vibrant across Europe but it’s very intensive as regards investment and labor. Maybe a hefty grant for construction of veal rearing facilities followed by a major greenwashing from Bord Bia etc?

As a farmer I feel that it’s beyond the boundaries of common decency to kill newborn calves. A former employee now works with a herd of purebred jerseys and it’s morally repulsive (to me as a farmer) to hear what goes on with the male jersey calves.

We, as farmers, have a moral obligation to care for all the animals on our farms...if we allow our standards to include euthanasia at birth then farming will be the poorer for it.
It’s vulgarity in its extremity.

Keep Sluicing · 16-10-2019 9:00am

12000 calves can be shipped per week as far as i know. There was approx 3500 calves culled/knackeried every week for Feb and March last year, will probably hit 4000 per week this year.
Know if 2 large herds locally (both school friends, so i take them at their word) that got confirmation that there jex bull calves will be taken by the usual dealer. One said hes getting a €5, the other is getting nothing because tge dealwr will collect twice a week.

mahoney_j · 16-10-2019 9:05am

Gawddawggonnit wrote: »

Time for a rethink on calves.

Who decided that veal is socially unacceptable in Ireland?
The veal industry is strong and vibrant across Europe but it’s very intensive as regards investment and labor. Maybe a hefty grant for construction of veal rearing facilities followed by a major greenwashing from Bord Bia etc?

As a farmer I feel that it’s beyond the boundaries of common decency to kill newborn calves. A former employee now works with a herd of purebred jerseys and it’s morally repulsive (to me as a farmer) to hear what goes on with the male jersey calves.

We, as farmers, have a moral obligation to care for all the animals on our farms...if we allow our standards to include euthanasia at birth then farming will be the poorer for it.
It’s vulgarity in its extremity.

On the money fully agree ,on calves was talking to 2 exporters in last week enquiring about calves for next spring and also 2 regular customers .farmers should be doing their homework now ,wouldn’t like to be trying to offload any extreme hols or jex type calves could be hard give them away .going to do bit of work setting up an old shed to hold calves over winter in case it’s needed ,hang few gates ,put stock board up on them for shelter etc .i will never put down a healthy calf nor send a calf to be put down

whelan2 · 16-10-2019 9:51am

Just had a dealer here for calves. My calves are sold off cow. Have had 3 dealers on to me for calves. No problem selling them. He said he went to a farm yesterday they had 22 aa calves on teat feeder. He took none of them. Calves in the mart yesterday and some of them got no bid. He will be back next week for 7 more.

Say my name · 16-10-2019 10:31am

mahoney_j wrote: »

On the money fully agree ,on calves was talking to 2 exporters in last week enquiring about calves for next spring and also 2 regular customers .farmers should be doing their homework now ,wouldn’t like to be trying to offload any extreme hols or jex type calves could be hard give them away .going to do bit of work setting up an old shed to hold calves over winter in case it’s needed ,hang few gates ,put stock board up on them for shelter etc .i will never put down a healthy calf nor send a calf to be put down

Have you got your charity status registered?

All well and good saying you or I with our square calves won't put down calves.
But the simple truth is you or I are probably exporting those poor unfortunates to be hacked with a machete on the streets of Tripoli.

The suckler farmers don't get off out of this either exporting the same out to the backyards of Turkey.

Tbh if it came to it with an either or. I'd rather pull the trigger on the bolt gun here on farm than have the animal go out to the head lobbers.

But I'm a pragmatist who depends on them for a living so the more my few bulls sell in the Mart the better.

K.G. · 16-10-2019 10:34am

Good calves will still move,the trick is to have them good.the days of lamping the calf off at 10 days maybe disappearing.some of the steam for work is going out of lads a d you might see more hd/aa calves.rather than fr jex as fellas come near their potential herd size

mahoney_j · 16-10-2019 10:48am

Say my name wrote: »

Have you got your charity status registered?

All well and good saying you or I with our square calves won't put down calves.
But the simple truth is you or I are probably exporting those poor unfortunates to be hacked with a machete on the streets of Tripoli.

The suckler farmers don't get off out of this either exporting the same out to the backyards of Turkey.

Tbh if it came to it with an either or. I'd rather pull the trigger on the bolt gun here on farm than have the animal go out to the head lobbers.

But I'm a pragmatist who depends on them for a living so the more my few bulls sell in the Mart the better.

I ain’t a charity and in August I refused an offer from an exporter to buy fr/aa bull weanlings for Libya,sold few weeks later to Irish farmer for finishing in his farm .good calves will still have a home ...at a price the big problem will be for 5/6 weeks in February March .our main body who shoved expansion and jex on us ad lib without a thought of beef/suckler man or resulting calves have done very little if anything to provide a viable solution ,either way it’s too late

Say my name · 16-10-2019 11:08am

mahoney_j wrote: »

I ain’t a charity and in August I refused an offer from an exporter to buy fr/aa bull weanlings for Libya,sold few weeks later to Irish farmer for finishing in his farm .good calves will still have a home ...at a price the big problem will be for 5/6 weeks in February March .our main body who shoved expansion and jex on us ad lib without a thought of beef/suckler man or resulting calves have done very little if anything to provide a viable solution ,either way it’s too late

If you sell in a Mart your calves or yearlings could end up anywhere.
If you sell to an Irishman/Muckit they're looking for €100 and the beast for free.
Everyone paddles their own canoe.

whelan2 · 16-10-2019 11:11am

As long as the boats keep sailing the calves will keep moving

mf240 · 16-10-2019 12:40pm

If some lads only pissed crooked theyed blame teagasc

Gawddawggonnit · 16-10-2019 1:04pm

mf240 wrote: »

If some lads only pissed crooked theyed blame teagasc

They do have to share some of the responsibility.
Encouraging farmers to plunge into xbreds without ever signaling the inevitable consequences demonstrates that. It isn’t like they didn’t know...

Gawddawggonnit · 16-10-2019 1:11pm

whelan2 wrote: »

As long as the boats keep sailing the calves will keep moving

The boats keep sailing because Irish/UK calves are used to keep downward pressure on calf prices throughout the EU. Is that sustainable?

I’ve posted before about a young lady that produces 1k calves to veal per year. She took a lot (250) of ‘cheap’ Irish calves last year...she won’t be doing that again.
It’s always too easy to give a dog a bad name.

Gawddawggonnit · 16-10-2019 1:13pm

K.G. wrote: »

Good calves will still move,the trick is to have them good.the days of lamping the calf off at 10 days maybe disappearing.some of the steam for work is going out of lads a d you might see more hd/aa calves.rather than fr jex as fellas come near their potential herd size

Isn’t it illegal to sell/move a calf at under 15days?
It is here.

davidk1394 · 16-10-2019 1:40pm

There should be a shift away from jerseys and cross bred herds simply because of the bull calf. If dairy farming goes down the route of shooting (putting it bluntly) perfectly healthy male
calves simply because of their breed. Ireland could loose our green image and be put in the same class as New Zealand.
Like a previous poster said, set up a veal finishing programme in Ireland. It is probably more humane than shipping young calves across to Europe.

whelan2 · 16-10-2019 1:51pm

Gawddawggonnit wrote: »

Isn’t it illegal to sell/move a calf at under 15days?
It is here.

10 days farm to farm or mart. 14 days for export

Gawddawggonnit · 16-10-2019 2:37pm

whelan2 wrote: »

10 days farm to farm or mart. 14 days for export

It’s going to 21days next year, or the year after, and rightly so because the buyer will be more sure of their purchases. Buying a 10 day old calf at the mart is a recipe for hardship.

longgonesilver · 16-10-2019 3:01pm

I don't think anyone is allowing mart sales at 10 days. 10days is more for direct farm to farm sales. General welfare rule also apply if the calf in the mart is deemed not fit for sale.
Selling very young calves is no good to buyer or seller and is a disaster for the calf.

Muckit · 16-10-2019 4:22pm

https://youtu.be/8gvPPA0Qwpk

Say my name · 16-10-2019 5:24pm

I wonder how many beef plan members went in on this?

https://www.thatsfarming.com/news/jack-jan-2019

Will I still be getting my €130 head for freisian bulls?

Sheep breeder · 17-10-2019 12:08am

Say my name wrote: »

I wonder how many beef plan members went in on this?

https://www.thatsfarming.com/news/jack-jan-2019

Will I still be getting my €130 head for freisian bulls?

This veal was tried a few year ago with Slaney and was not a runner due to finish price, a few guys in the south east were at it and were very good fatteners and couldn’t make it pay.

Sheep breeder · 17-10-2019 12:13am

Base price wrote: »

IMO it will be no different than any other year. It's not like it's a feckin new situation :rolleyes:

Quality dairy bull calves will ship and go for onward feeding for veal in mainland Europe. The rest will be reared by farmers or culled in DAFM approved facilitates.

Can’t see a cull in DAFM factories or subsidies paid for these calves, would be the death nail for beef and the green sell image would be lost. The dairy men may step up and feed these calves properly. The amount of young calves that are poorly fed from day one is a lot of the problem with thrive.

Bass Reeves · 17-10-2019 12:20am

I do not have any hangup's about Veal what i have a huge issue with is the expectation that these systems can change Irish beef production. All Veal production would be is another high cost production system. Will lads promoting this system guarantee a beef price for veal 7-8 months in advance. The simple answer is no. it would be similar to U16 months friesian bull beef high cost labour intensive system with the farmer taking all the risk for what would be a low profit system. Sorry No thanks.

I think there is a number of misconceptions regarding calves. The first is that as ling as a dairy farmers gets a calf to 10-14 days the losses stop there. There seems to be a theory that there will always be a get out of jail market in the form of Kebabs or export.

By the end of the year we will have exported about 200K calves and kebabed another 14K. The Irish farmer still hovered up 1.3 million of them. For how much longer will we be able to export calves at that rate is questionable but if Irish farmers demand drops can exporters and Mr Kebab make up the difference and what effect will this have on prices. We saw last year that Fr calves fell to 20-50 euro for a while and Jex calves were unsalable.

The farmers that is sure he has an outlet for Jex calves at no cost is deluded, If MR Kebab gets an over supply either this farmer will have to pay for to get his calves taken or some one else will and therefore take his place in the que. Its the same with export. While the issue's of calf price was isolated mostly to the Cork region last year who to say it will not be more widespread next year.

I killed an R grade AA bullock this week. Bought him last year at 335kgs in September he hung 330 kgs DW and after deductions he left 1226 euro he was bang on 30 months. He was a suckler bred one. He did 0.8kg LW gain/day. He had eaten about 250kgs of ration. Friesian's hung in early August did 0.86/kgs LW/day from November to August they had only eaten 80kgs of ration. IMO a ;ot of AA calves are no better than Friesians just lads have not copped it yet.

What is the max number of calves that can go into kebabs or can be shipped. Can Mr Kebab take 20K+ next year, can we export 250-300K calves because that seems to be the way it may be going. And if we can what effect will this have on domestic and export prices prices. will the 14 day old Friesian be free, will the AA and He bull calf drop 50-80/head, will MR Kebab be wantinga 20 euro note with every calf coming in the door

Sheep breeder · 17-10-2019 12:32am

Bass Reeves wrote: »

I do not have any hangup's about Veal what i have a huge issue with is the expectation that these systems can change Irish beef production. All Veal production would be is another high cost production system. Will lads promoting this system guarantee a beef price for veal 7-8 months in advance. The simple answer is no. it would be similar to U16 months friesian bull beef high cost labour intensive system with the farmer taking all the risk for what would be a low profit system. Sorry No thanks.

I think there is a number of misconceptions regarding calves. The first is that as ling as a dairy farmers gets a calf to 10-14 days the losses stop there. There seems to be a theory that there will always be a get out of jail market in the form of Kebabs or export.

By the end of the year we will have exported about 200K calves and kebabed another 14K. The Irish farmer still hovered up 1.3 million of them. For how much longer will we be able to export calves at that rate is questionable but if Irish farmers demand drops can exporters and Mr Kebab make up the difference and what effect will this have on prices. We saw last year that Fr calves fell to 20-50 euro for a while and Jex calves were unsalable.

The farmers that is sure he has an outlet for Jex calves at no cost is deluded, If MR Kebab gets an over supply either this farmer will have to pay for to get his calves taken or some one else will and therefore take his place in the que. Its the same with export. While the issue's of calf price was isolated mostly to the Cork region last year who to say it will not be more widespread next year.

I killed an R grade AA bullock this week. Bought him last year at 335kgs in September he hung 330 kgs DW and after deductions he left 1226 euro he was bang on 30 months. He was a suckler bred one. He did 0.8kg LW gain/day. He had eaten about 250kgs of ration. Friesian's hung in early August did 0.86/kgs LW/day from November to August they had only eaten 80kgs of ration. IMO a ;ot of AA calves are no better than Friesians just lads have not copped it yet.

What is the max number of calves that can go into kebabs or can be shipped. Can Mr Kebab take 20K+ next year, can we export 250-300K calves because that seems to be the way it may be going. And if we can what effect will this have on domestic and export prices prices. will the 14 day old Friesian be free, will the AA and He bull calf drop 50-80/head, will MR Kebab be wantinga 20 euro note with every calf coming in the door

Very good post, export will only take what is required. As for the AA agree totally with the breed going down the road of easy calving and black to colour the xbred and totally forgot about being a beef breed.

Say my name · 17-10-2019 12:52am

Sheep breeder wrote: »

This veal was tried a few year ago with Slaney and was not a runner due to finish price, a few guys in the south east were at it and were very good fatteners and couldn’t make it pay.

I know.
But there's talks of bringing in Dutch farmers to do it here in this country or some of the natives having a go at it again.
The irish factories must be rubbing their hands again.
The merry go round is starting all over.

There seriously is no other way other than approved euthanasia in approved premises for the poorest of the poor quality.
There can be talk of bord bia regulations and green image and whatnot but if they are all reared it'll flood the home market and beef price will plumet more and no one will be winners bar the factory man.
And regulation means nothing one injection to a cow scanned with a bull calf and you've a cow calving weeks before her time with a dead calf. There'll always be ways around them.
The powers that be would be best advised just to make the best of a bad lot.

jaymla627 · 17-10-2019 7:46am

Bass Reeves wrote: »

I do not have any hangup's about Veal what i have a huge issue with is the expectation that these systems can change Irish beef production. All Veal production would be is another high cost production system. Will lads promoting this system guarantee a beef price for veal 7-8 months in advance. The simple answer is no. it would be similar to U16 months friesian bull beef high cost labour intensive system with the farmer taking all the risk for what would be a low profit system. Sorry No thanks.

I think there is a number of misconceptions regarding calves. The first is that as ling as a dairy farmers gets a calf to 10-14 days the losses stop there. There seems to be a theory that there will always be a get out of jail market in the form of Kebabs or export.

By the end of the year we will have exported about 200K calves and kebabed another 14K. The Irish farmer still hovered up 1.3 million of them. For how much longer will we be able to export calves at that rate is questionable but if Irish farmers demand drops can exporters and Mr Kebab make up the difference and what effect will this have on prices. We saw last year that Fr calves fell to 20-50 euro for a while and Jex calves were unsalable.

The farmers that is sure he has an outlet for Jex calves at no cost is deluded, If MR Kebab gets an over supply either this farmer will have to pay for to get his calves taken or some one else will and therefore take his place in the que. Its the same with export. While the issue's of calf price was isolated mostly to the Cork region last year who to say it will not be more widespread next year.

I killed an R grade AA bullock this week. Bought him last year at 335kgs in September he hung 330 kgs DW and after deductions he left 1226 euro he was bang on 30 months. He was a suckler bred one. He did 0.8kg LW gain/day. He had eaten about 250kgs of ration. Friesian's hung in early August did 0.86/kgs LW/day from November to August they had only eaten 80kgs of ration. IMO a ;ot of AA calves are no better than Friesians just lads have not copped it yet.

What is the max number of calves that can go into kebabs or can be shipped. Can Mr Kebab take 20K+ next year, can we export 250-300K calves because that seems to be the way it may be going. And if we can what effect will this have on domestic and export prices prices. will the 14 day old Friesian be free, will the AA and He bull calf drop 50-80/head, will MR Kebab be wantinga 20 euro note with every calf coming in the door

20 euros to get knackery man to euthanize and dispose of calf, all fr bulls where exported here last year and had a 100 odd euro of milk drank before going, they averaged 30 euro a head the knackery option would of saved us thousands....
exporters took the piss price wise last year they have alienated farmers who spent the money rearing a suitable calf to then turn around and pay basically nothing, then when badly done calves are turned out at martd they will be releasing press releases saying lads need to feed their calves better

Siamsa Sessions · 17-10-2019 8:51am

Two simple points:

(1) Animal-welfare protests could end up stopping live exports - it's part of the wider environment/climate/green movement

(2) Veal processing in Ireland was tried previously as far as I know, but seasonal supply makes it uneconomical for processors

Glanbia's dairy-beef programme shows they are at least aware of the issue, but there's bigger schemes or plans needed at Government/Teagasc level. You can't let farmers carry the sole responsibility on this as one bad apple getting videoed shooting and dumping calves will impact the whole dairy industry and Ireland's fairytale image.

_Brian · 17-10-2019 9:06am

If we get to treating a million animals a year as a byproduct and don’t care what happens them we are loosing our farming ethos to factory farming and I’d rather see the country planted end to end.

K.G. · 17-10-2019 9:07am

You do know that if calf prices fall and ration price s remain close to where they are its the suckler cow that is totally uneconomic.

Bass Reeves · 17-10-2019 9:29am

jaymla627 wrote: »

20 euros to get knackery man to euthanize and dispose of calf, all fr bulls where exported here last year and had a 100 odd euro of milk drank before going, they averaged 30 euro a head the knackery option would of saved us thousands....
exporters took the piss price wise last year they have alienated farmers who spent the money rearing a suitable calf to then turn around and pay basically nothing, then when badly done calves are turned out at martd they will be releasing press releases saying lads need to feed their calves better

There are two problems first we are not set up to handle a explosive jump in either calf exports or in calf slaughtering. As I posted any system will react by to a jump in product by either dropping price or increasing cost.

The real problem is that calf/store men are at the whip end of the present beef price debacle. The real issue is how much has there confident been effected and how many will exit the production system. 2020 could be a very tricky spring for dairy farmers as in there rush over the last 2-3 years to get calves out younger and younger has resulted in a glut of calves that take more labour to rear.

The market will not tolerate a booby calf system so a solution will have to be found. Most of the problem is the present beef price we need a minimum base of 3.9/kg and maybe dairy farmers should be pressurizing IFA and ICMSA in this direction. However in itself this is not the total answer Dairy farmers themselves have to look at there system and make sure a commercial calf is produce. A bullock grading O- at 330kgs will not make 1100 euro at present, at O= and a base of 3.95 he hits 1300 euro. That is where the answer lies.

Siamsa Sessions wrote: »

Two simple points:

(1) Animal-welfare protests could end up stopping live exports - it's part of the wider environment/climate/green movement

(2) Veal processing in Ireland was tried previously as far as I know, but seasonal supply makes it uneconomical for processors

Glanbia's dairy-beef programme shows they are at least aware of the issue, but there's bigger schemes or plans needed at Government/Teagasc level. You can't let farmers carry the sole responsibility on this as one bad apple getting videoed shooting and dumping calves will impact the whole dairy industry and Ireland's fairytale image.

Glanbia Dairy beef scheme is rubbish, it wants no P grading cattle so taht exclued all JEx's and poorer quality Friesians. As well you must buy your inputs from Glanbia and movements are restricted to just a single transfer. Another brainfart.

K.G. wrote: »

You do know that if calf prices fall and ration price s remain close to where they are its the suckler cow that is totally uneconomic.

The suckler cows is an anomoly producing 0.8 weaned calves/cow cannot be a profitable system

Muckit · 17-10-2019 9:46am

K.G. wrote: »

You do know that if calf prices fall and ration price s remain close to where they are its the suckler cow that is totally uneconomic.

According to research carried out by Teagasc on video l posted, rearing dairy bred stock to beef at current beef prices does not provide a return.... EVEN if a FREISAIN bull calf is got for FREE.

This is why l started this thread. It fairly serious IMO. Lads are talking about jerseys and that if u have anything other than Jersey calves it's not an issue for you. Well it will and it is.

Dairy farmers would want to educate themselves on the grid and see how these cattle are treated and the heavy penalties they face.

Panch18 · 17-10-2019 10:26am

Base price wrote: »

IMO it will be no different than any other year. It's not like it's a feckin new situation :rolleyes:

Quality dairy bull calves will ship and go for onward feeding for veal in mainland Europe. The rest will be reared by farmers or culled in DAFM approved facilitates.

Shur it’s ireland, we love talking ourselves into a mess!!

Not sure what the drama is about to be honest. We managed last year and that’s with boats being cancelled because of weather

Say my name · 17-10-2019 10:36am

Panch18 wrote: »

Shur it’s ireland, we love talking ourselves into a mess!!

Not sure what the drama is about to be honest. We managed last year and that’s with boats being cancelled because of weather

I blame Darragh McCullough. That fella just likes to hear himself.

I think most people missed the beer money talk of calves on here over the last six years.

davidk1394 · 17-10-2019 10:40am

Muckit wrote: »

Dairy farmers would want to educate themselves on the grid and see how these cattle are treated and the heavy penalties they face.

Dairy farmers dont care about the grid or how beef farmers are doing. Once the calf is gone for next spring there okay for another year.

If they fed the bull calf right from birth with the right amount of colostrum and milk for the first two weeks it means a lot to the person buying them. Speaking from experience, I bought calves off a farmer for €100/ calf they were AA. I bought other calves same breed for € 120/calf. The difference was for an extra 20 these calves were fed right, this meant fewer sick calves, better thrive and finished sooner with less meal. Year after I didn't go back to the first farmer.

Siamsa Sessions · 17-10-2019 10:48am

Bass Reeves wrote: »

Glanbia Dairy beef scheme is rubbish, it wants no P grading cattle so taht exclued all JEx's and poorer quality Friesians. As well you must buy your inputs from Glanbia and movements are restricted to just a single transfer. Another brainfart.

Just to clarify: I think Glanbia's scheme is rubbish too and I'd leave the animals go hungry before I'd buy anything from them.

My only point is that they are aware of the calf/byproduct issue. I'm sure they don't care about the farmer or the calf but it's their "green" image they fear will be affected.

Same goes for Government who benefit from all the exports - their first concern is with the marketing image and that's the real starting point.

Muckit · 17-10-2019 11:02am

davidk1394 wrote: »

If they fed the bull calf right from birth with the right amount of colostrum and milk for the first two weeks it means a lot to the person buying them.

I was driving through my own parish at the weekend when the car and van ahead of pulled up abruptly. After a few choice words to myself l realised why they had stopped, there were goats on the side of the road. Goats? Who/how/where did they come out of?

As l hopped to turn them into the field with the other motorists, l realised that they were in fact calves.... just about. They were bad ones. And very bad ones. Their bellies were the biggest part of them, but the rest of them were skin and bone. Even big patches of skin gone. And one lad had his tongue out the side of its head from the little exertion of the few yards to the field.

They weren't belong to a dairy farmer but had been bought m would imagine to fatten. God help us.

whelan2 · 17-10-2019 11:08am

davidk1394 wrote: »

Dairy farmers dont care about the grid or how beef farmers are doing. Once the calf I'd gone for next spring there okay for another year.

If they fed the bull calf right from birth with the right amount of colostrum and milk for the first two weeks it means a lot to the person buying them. Speaking from experience, I bought calves off a farmer for €100/ calf they were AA. I bought other calves same breed for € 120/calf. The difference was for an extra 20 these calves were fed right, this meant fewer sick calves, better thrive and finished sooner with less meal. Year after I didn't go back to the first farmer.

There will be no market for crap calves and rightly so.

Gawddawggonnit · 17-10-2019 12:20pm

I’ve followed this thread because I think it’s an important issue.

There’s the posters that agree there shouldn’t be slaughtering of newborns...

There’s the posters that say... ‘be grand’.

Either way, slaughtering new born calves, or as one poster suggested, slaughter in utero, will not wash with consumers.

How long before the animal welfare cadre do an exposé on the thousands of newborns going for ‘kebabs’...? Or an auld ‘Prime Time Investigates’...?
FR2 tv would absolutely love to dig the dirt on newborns being slaughtered. They’d fatten making such an exposé!

IFA/Creed etc do not need to be explaining or even trying to justify such practices. The biggest threat, imo, is if the ‘be grand’ brigade get their way and the industry blindly continues down the track...too late to change when the damage is done.

Gawddawggonnit · 17-10-2019 12:23pm

K.G. wrote: »

You do know that if calf prices fall and ration price s remain close to where they are its the suckler cow that is totally uneconomic.

What exactly has the suckler cow/calf got to do with slaughtering newborn calves KG?

Panch18 · 17-10-2019 12:34pm

Gawddawggonnit wrote: »

I’ve followed this thread because I think it’s an important issue.

There’s the posters that agree there shouldn’t be slaughtering of newborns...

There’s the posters that say... ‘be grand’.

Either way, slaughtering new born calves, or as one poster suggested, slaughter in utero, will not wash with consumers.

How long before the animal welfare cadre do an exposé on the thousands of newborns going for ‘kebabs’...? Or an auld ‘Prime Time Investigates’...?
FR2 tv would absolutely love to dig the dirt on newborns being slaughtered. They’d fatten making such an exposé!

IFA/Creed etc do not need to be explaining or even trying to justify such practices. The biggest threat, imo, is if the ‘be grand’ brigade get their way and the industry blindly continues down the track...too late to change when the damage is done.

Out of curiosity what do ye do with the bull calves in France? You seem to be using a fairly high output Holstein cows so your bull calves must be nothing to write home about from a grading point of view. What do you and similar to you do with yer bulls??

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

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