It depends. Is she in calf or has she a calf with her? Lactating cows need more. 5 months is a long winter. Hopefully you get away with 4 months feeding maybe less
The price of bullocks last October was 4.15. I was paying €265 for a finishing ration.
A 400kg br grade bullock was coming into €1740. He is now coming into €2000 at a base of €4.80. So he’s up €260.
Meal is now costing me €395. To feed that bullock last year for 8 weeks cost €75. To feed him this year is costing €110.
Your meal is costing €35 more to feed the bullock than last year but you’ll get €260 more for him.
Meal is not adding a cost to the bullocks. It’s adding value to them. I’d feed them on for a month or 6 weeks then either mart them or feed on another few weeks.
Stores and weanlings always come back in price in October/November. You can replace them them with lighter cattle.
Plus 1
Lads are afraid to pay for meal. Meal pays in the right circumstances. It gets bad press unduly so.
Meal at the right time to an animal especially a bullock can make a serious difference. Especially for the next month or two as the power leaves the grass.
Killed 4 cows straight off calves last Friday, €4.60 for o+, all the same grade
where that
I have just seen Silage advertised on Done Deal €60 a bale collected must be powerful stuff !
I'd be more worried factory offering 4.70 next week for bullocks.
It’s the same with lads not wanting to spread a bag or two of fertiliser per grazing acre over the course of the year . It costs 40 to 100 euros per acre .
How much land would you get for 100 euros per acre ?
In regards to meal feeding, it has up to this point in time payed to feed meal, and i'm looking at this from a suckler point of view.
When i'm selling forward stores at 12 months of age i'm no worse off having mealed them over the winter.
Last spring i seen stores sold for 2.30/kg, never seen a nut, those same stores with a bit of feeding could have averaged up near 3/kg, the fella that reared them would be no worse off.
Maybe next spring will be the exception to that, payed 470/t for meal today and had a look in the mart, autumn born stores were averaging 3/kg or maybe a touch with it, i only stopped in for half an hour so a small sample size but if that's the price for stores next spring i'll loose money for sure.
Doing there best to pull price but can't see it happening.
Are they doing their best to pull it as they suspect it’s going to have to rise towards the winter one way or another.
Hope you are right
It ain’t a prediction based on any knowledge.
Just all the talk of the killing of sub 600kg cattle (in cojunction with lads feeding less) should theoretically lead to a tightening of supply.
Theoretically….
The other factor is the world cup in Mid November to mid December. The be slaughtering for that from mid October
any prices for this week?
Let’s hope England get to the final so
Yeah but sweet Jesus don't let them win it regardless of the beef prices 😅
Not in the mood for 2 WWs and 2WCs....
Anyone getting any more than €4.70 base?
€4.75 in midlands
4.75 south east
Is any one else finding there cattle weighing poorly this year? My weights are back a nice bit on last year
I think that’s a problem only in the good dry parts of the country this year. Cattle killing well here this year. Killed a few ch off grass with no meal last week and a few of them came into fs 4’s.
My weights are diabolical too.
Ye my weights were back on usual too. my land would be dry and the hot weather wouldn't have suited, plus I was down with TB and I find have to get cattle in to test them and read them a few times during the summer can often disturb their thrive.
So what is a qa 28 month old chx 680kg live weight r=3+ steer worth in the meat factory at 4.75 base price? Thanks
I had the same type of cattle at the same weight as last year when purchased and they killed out 19 kgs dead weight less,,
Yeah I find the tb very disruptive. Tested twice here this year too and in my case I didn’t see much of a need for it.
You are a brave man if you will hold out until october.Mart prices are shocking for heavy cows this week .I know the slump happens every year around this time and sometimes pick up later on but I would not be betting on that this year .450 kg fr stores are just about making E750 does not leave the rearer with much to cover costs
Yea I think the slump is happening a bit earlier this year due to grass shortage in a lot of areas. Birr mart on Monday had a lot of 400-450kg whiteheads selling from €1.80 - €2.10 per kg. They were €2.10-€2.50 a few weeks ago.
When your choosing calves in the mart how do you do this ??? How do I know their terminal figures in icbf ??