Lads might be eager but stovk are scarce. They cannot be a lot of heavy cull cows around too many killed last spring. Last Autumn the processors killed a lot of AA&HE 18-22 month old stock.
There is no glut of autumn cattle with the last couple of years. They have completely discouraged the heavy 33 month old continental cattle the smaller lads now sell them as stores. 20-24 month Friesian and FriesianX bulls have disappeared as well as they were pricing them ridiculously low to the smaller producer
If you are a small lad sending in Friesian bullocks that are P's grade you get 4.45/ kg locally and 4.4 if a P= or a little short of flesh. That less than P cow price. The smaller finishers are walking away from it one by one or reducing numbers to limit ration and fertilizer.
Lads are taking the only option they have and f@@king off to draw the environment payments. You can fool all of the people some of the time,some of the people all the time. It hard to fool all the people all the time.
Most younger lads with jobs have higher costs than there parents. A smaller lad with a farm if he is not making a few bob out of it is looking at making life easier and is not willing to work for nothing.
With full employment any lad in a trade could make the margin on a bullock by working a Saturday OT. Often it's a lot handier no pulling and dragging.
Silage could be 70 a bale in January. I see a lot of people buffer feeding etc. Might be an idea to sell silage in January and buy the cheap stock that will definitely be available
Assumption is the mother of all f@@kups. With high ration prices processors will need to give some indication of beef prices to finishers. At present finishers are competing with processors for stock in the marts. Would you buy 500kg friesian bullocks at 1100 euro add marts fees and transport to you are @ 1130. What will you need to finish those cattle. Feeding costs will be at least 4/day. Add 50 for fixed cost vet/meds/dosing and transport to factory. Add a margin of 150 euro. That bullock will need 6.13/kg to do that. Assume they grade O- average that is a base of 6.25.
hard to see stores going for nothing if that happens
What’ll you feed the cheap cattle with when you have your silage sold?
Cattle eat alot of silage from November to end of January, of you are set up for end of March turnout then you will only be feeding for 60 days. If you do not buy in stores in September/ October it will allow you to close a lot of the farm in late September/early October. You should have a good bank of grass in the Spring.
Keep some of it or buy around March
I can’t see stock being too cheap next spring if silage to keep them over the winter is costing 70 euros a bale .
They will be because the price of fertiliser if you can get it will be gone through the roof by then.
Tongue in cheek response to suggestion to sell all silage and then buy cattle……..
Seeing bales making 50 on dd as it is. Hardly going to be much more silage cut this year?
I can’t remember the processor ever caring about winter finishers.
When you are down to finishing cattle out of the shed you are in real trouble especially this year with the cost of silage and ration.
Big talk about the surge in demand in Irish whiskey. I wonder will there be more of a shift in to growing grain?
They be like Guinness with malt barley here in the midlands when Greencore pulled the plug on it and decided to import it instead.
I’m half thinking of keeping what I’ve here at the moment. 10 are fit to go I’ll either mart them or factory this week. The rest are ave600kgs. Might be no harm feed them on this winter and kill off grass next June/July rather than factory end of October. It’ll be a second winter for some but might be hard replace them at the prices at the moment.
I watched a bit of balla mart bull ring today serious quality cattle with prices to match it a good few buyers from up the country aswell
The one thing about keeping cattle long term is not good business imo. Keeping them two winters is a very expensive enterprise. A friend of mine who buys a lot of cattle always says long term cattle don't pay. I don't see cattle getting any dearer the European housewife will be under pressure and she ant going to pay for expensive beef. If those cattle have a bit of flesh at all if it were me I'd meal them and finish them in a couple of months if you had dry ground.
Be as well on finishing them if they are 600kg..what breed are they?
It would all depend on the cattle if they would be under 30 or 36 months next June/ July then maybe. It would all depend on the frame of the animal.
However I do not think prices will collapse this autumn. The 2022 world cup is starting the 20th November. Processors will be needing cattle no matter the numbers IMO until after Christmas
Neither can I see a price collapse next year. While the housewife may struggle the pork, bacon and chicken producers will not produce at a loss for very long. With energy costs going up chicken will get more expensive and so will pigmeat.
The repercussions of the drought on the Continent has yet to fully impact the market. Milk is at a base of 60c/ L which means a lot of milk producers are getter nearer 70 than 60c/ L.
Cattle can only be slaughtered once.
Milk base for July was 56inc vat so the most are getting 60c
600 kg. Definitely better off putting them through the mart for handier sized fellows and doing a few improvements with the balance
At 600 kgs I be finishing them, grass will come fast after this rain 4-5 kgs of ration and kill end of October.
Very few cattle making more in the mart than in the factory. More than likely if you sell in the mart they will be slaughtered anyway.
If they are continental cattle they will hang 350 end of October.
If they are continentals then they would be closer to 400. Grass will be a while coming. If you had the grass to feed them it might be worth keeping them. There isn’t much power in grass this time of the year, it doesn’t go as long
Next July is almost 300 days away still. If they’re 600kgs now they’ll be 850-900 kgs by then and be killing out at anything up to 550kgs. Depending on how trade and demand is at the time you could end up with cow prices at them weights.
I’d definitely be hanging them this side of Xmas and they should be comfortably above a 400kg carcass.
Not if I won the lotto am I putting meal into them. It’s keeping cost down not add to it I want here.
What kind of cattle are they
Continentals
So feeding silage all winter and grass next summer won't cost more than 4kgs to finish the end of October!
€50-€100 of meal each depending on silage quality should see them to the factory..why not kill them and buy lighter ones to store and kill early next spring?
How much would it cost to store a cow/600kg animal for 5 month winter .Would they eat 6 bales of wilted silage with no ration t,hat would be 240 euro silage alone
If they ate continental's feed them 5 kgs for 6-7 weeks. 220-250 kgs per head. Or 100-120 euro worth of ration.
They will eat at least that in silage over the winter if not 200 ish euro of it. If they are going over 36 months next spring you are losing at losing 8-20c cent per kg or half to 2/3 of the price of the ration.
At 350 kgs DW grading R+ the should make 1750-1800/ head. At 400 kgs DW 2k+.
If you do not replace them this autumn you will have to replace net spring
I notice the Grass must be starting to come I had Fertilizer spread since June which hadn't got rain. The Cattle were being fed Silage for the time period in between which is top quality but the past few days they don't seem to be as hungry for it.
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