Not sure what icbf has to do with calf excretion rates
Monthly stock figures for excretion rates
I keep track of my monthly livestock excretion rates myself up to July when the dept wake up and give us monthly figures from July to December I have questioned many times why the dept cannot give us monthly figures from the start of the year but have not got any logical answer
I’ve been having little but negative thoughts about cows and farming recently but the heat, blue sky, and grass growth today is definitely lifting the spirits.
What was grazed in late January got 2000 gallons of slurry last week and has as much cover as the softer ground that hasn’t been grazed yet.
your not busy enjoy if you've time to think, thats all thats wrong!!
few milk cheques and good weather and the mood will improve
Do you know first hand? I'm not questioning your integrity or saying everything was perfect there, but there's quite the rumour mill of horseshite going around too, which suits many, as the alternative message might interfere with BAU. There's farmers achieving similar results to Solohead with similar methods too.
Yes saw it with my own two eyes what exactly went on there
There was an alleged supplementation of about a tonne ofwhich still leaves them growing 14 odd t DM from clover. How much are you saying they're actually growing?
Haven't a clue what they are growing to be honest,but I have seen nitrogen spread there in 2023 and it was all done on the quite. Also a lot of their silage has been bought in the last few years,and let's just say what was written down on the invoice wasn't bales of silage.
That is not a typical farm due to it's history in fairness.
The boys in Kerry must be starting to get worried about the supply of replacement heifers going forward. They have set up an online market place for buying and selling dairy heifer calves.
Fair play to tirlain for coming up with this scheme, nice bit of outside the box thinking
looks like co ops are getting very worried about where the milk is going to come from from in the future- this scheme will keep lads milking who might have thought about getting out
340 kg fr heifers making 1200 in marts for beef this week
Il say it again, it's an age thing. My shoulder is at me these days. Milking heifers is a young man's business and young people don’t want to do it. There only hope is factory type farms with employees and regular time off
The New Zealand industry large scale is built on foreign young workers looking to experience the country and the farm sponsorship and visa gives them the chance to see it. If Ireland was a bit more warmer and the laws maybe changed to have it mandatory to do farm work to get access to the country then we may have some hope.
I see there's workers from Nepal brought in to saudi arabia and they are dying in their thousands every year on construction sites with the bad treatment and conditions. But then white people from here go there for dairy management jobs for high wages.
On the heifers. It seems touchwood, I've been lucky this year. The breeding of the montbeliarde bull they are by is by Cortil out of a Podge cow. I've probably jinxed myself now with the few left to calve but how and ever.
Edit: the californian and new mexico large scale dairy farms are built on mexican labour. Most illegal aliens who are paid peanuts.
My own are quite enough too. I must have strained my shoulder last week and there's a good bit of pulling and lifting this time of year
On the labour thing its hard to get outside labour as cheap as at what alot of owner/operators are working at.that being said bar the manic 6 weeks in spring time there s not alot of pressure on most farms labourwise.from what I ve heard there's 2 issues with foreign workers on irish dairy setups.most go through the motions of the jobs but lack that little bit of animal husbandry and secondly planking someone from a another country in the middle of the countryside with poor English working on their own all day is not good for mental health.i even see it myself during the winter you d be only looking to see someone on the days herself is working if you re in the yard all day
A neighbour has a foreigner 12 months now, he came from a 1700 dairy farm and is great at animal husbandry stuff AIing and milking , but no driving license but will have it shortly
The country would be better off leaving the dairy industry go to the wall if that's the only future.
I see loads of youngsters around here mad for farming, especially dairying but they will find it difficult to get going. I've said it before, but I think the property laws in this country are counterproductive for agriculture.
A young fella near here did a couple of years in Saudi on a farm and he was ai ing a 100 cows a day .you wouldn't be long getting good at animal husbandry if you were handling those kinda numbers
A lot of hedges cut and thick slurry spread 😉
in fairness its a great start to the new milking year, cows here are pumping out the gold just doing shy of 33litres or 2.68 kgs solids ,only waiting for the last 3 cows to calve.lost 2 calves 1 got tangled up in sheep hurdles that i had him behind.
That's huge production. What are they eating?
8kgs of meal average some cows on 10kgs, grass silage and grass .beet in the yard but has not been fed for a week as i am using tractor for field work ,
In fairness there isn't a twig out of place there......
This happened to me earlier after a long night. Got her our after trial and error
Did she find what she was looking for?
She did and more than she was looking for
We are mis selling this farm work lads. In January everyone wants a diet. I have dropped a notch on the belt during calving so I stood on a scales for the first time since new years. I have lost 6kgs. That's the way to find labour
