Accounts attached - The current reality facing beef farmers - Any advice?

They are not Spring calving. Calving is a bit spread out throughout the year (Majority somewhere between October & March), they are generally sold in Spring as weanlings though.

Landbase you are talking about 250 acres of marginal to good land in North-West of Ireland. Outwintering is out of the question, because once there is more than a week and a half's rain, heavy cattle start destoying the place to be honest. That straw/silage is almost entirely straw as all bought in. Probably about 10% overstocked.

Usually sell them as bullocks and hold off selling until Spring. There is an option to sell as weanlings in the back-end. Usually don't do this unless cash-flow really requires it. Usually the grants come in at back-end of the year that eases up cashflow a bit.

I have no option, can't cut the contractor out. Firstly don't have the machinery, the help or the time with the full-time job

I've broke down the diesel and farm vehicles there for you.

Ya bulk of fertiliser is pushing for second crops really. That seed isn't only for GLAS (Sorry badly presented) also for reseeding field that got sewed out during the year about 15 acre or 2.5ha. This is also increased the contractor cost a bit in this year. Probably as a whole increased expenses by €6k.

Thanks for the input.

I don't know if it would be possible to cut the costs by 30%. One possibility would be to decrease cow numbers, second cut and the amount of fertiliser needed for second cut. Not sure though because problem is there is a lot of ground here being cut three times. Just cutting it the once, may be as well to just lease out a section of it.

Really just reassessing it all. Don't like €40k from the government turning into €10k in previous year, just shows wastage on my behalf.

Considering a few options:

1) Continue as is & decrease costs and numbers.

2) Continue as is & start making losses

3) Look into organic

4) Lease part or all of farm

Harsh but maybe fair :) Yeah not going to lie I have found the transition from being from being somewhat involved in the farm to totally taking over the farm more challenging that expected. Especially in the cost control area, I have found that almost everyone you deal with is out to make more money from you.

To be honest my main frustration has been the amount of time that has went into it 75 sucklers calving, very often in the middle of night. I don't think long-term it mixes well with a full time job. They are very labour intensive. Then you are fighting with them to take milk from their mother and not to mention scour and all that.

I am going to read more into the organic side.

Can assure you have more to be at on a Tuesday than make up figures to chat about on Boards. Since last week's sale have been playing about with the numbers trying to figure out what best to do, with the price inflation etc. I know my father very often used his own money to bail out the farm and I don't at all want to go down that road. I want the farm to be profitable on its only stand without needing money.

Some of my figures are round because I have them rounded to the nearest thousand on excel. Like the grants etc. Was copying and pasting formulae, that is the only reason for the round numbers.

I am tempted not sure how much of that there is up Northwards direction. It is the calving of the suckers that kills me.

The only thing you could conceivably outwinter up here is sheep. It just gets too wet. There are more than enough sheds though to house them.

A good point though.

Cheers, just trying to get alternative and opposing views on the situation to myself. Main reason is the fear of getting €40k in grants and still making a loss is concerning. So up to reconsider my options.

Yeah 2021 figures are actual. Didn't fully appreciate the extent to which the costs escalated until did my year-end tots. Will keep a much tighter eye on it in the following years throughout.

Yeah the cows are what costs the money. Teagasc are quoting around €700 a cow per year and that only increases depending on the length of the winter. My aim is to keep as much of the grants as possible. Thing is I could finish my weanlings but currently don't have the money to feed them the amount of meal as would be needed. It is an option though to decrease the cow numbers a bit and to finish.

I think that finishing would be less labour intensive than calving.

The reason for the calving spread was because don't have the time or help to have large multiples of cows calving at the same time. It is just the full time job and calving is the most challenging part. Ideally it would all be done over say a three week period but that would be the annual leave all gone and kind of need that for other farming tasks.

Woodchip? That is a new one, was also recently suggested that Peat Moss is another alternative.

The ground is funny. It is good enough ground for three crops being pushed, but not the kind of ground that would outwinter stock. The rain around here is grim in winter and sometimes the rivers overflood too and leaves the place swamped. It recovers well though by Spring.