Dairy Chitchat 4, an udder new thread.

The grating thing is the whinging farmer narrative, the loudest commentators/farmers shouting about it, have never our will never be in a situation of a one man band struggling through a spring calving season...

Not have a dig but the o'learys are a great example, on a podcast recently they where making the point re the above but from her own articles over the years they've always had a army of helpers on farm, she hasn't the foggiest notion re the lived expirence of farms where the help just isnt available..

Macra/the journal/teagasc can sugarcoat things all they want, without a dose of realism in the conversation its all white noise

crazy stuff and 100% agree small changes and not been stubborn makes a huge difference on any farm …no excuse for not having proper hanging gates …not raking time off and thinking the place won’t function without you etc etc farming is hands on and jobs need to be done but small changes can make huge difference

with help around yard at a premium things like that so you can move/separate stock etc on your own are a must and cut so much hassle

Lots of people work hard. Have a tiler in doing a bathroom and he doesn't stop moving from 8 to 6. That a physical job up and down all day that takes a lot of concentration to do it right. I know I would be shattered after it.

Dairy farming there's a long day between milkings and outside a few busy periods, something has to be wrong to not take it easy for a good few hours most days.

It's a tale of extremes there. One could look at the slurry contractor as labour saving.

While some things are efficient, others are a mess. JFC calf feeders set up looks messy for what should be an efficiency plus but the new shed should hopefully sort it, although even with the structure standing he still doesn't seem to know the layout yet which is a must when you're building a calf shed around a particular system.

Various broken feed barriers in current sheds look messy but again new shed should again should sort it. But what stresses me are the amount of breakouts either onto a busy road or into wrong paddocks, a TAMS application to fence the entire farm would be the best money they can spend.

Dunno whether this is better suited in the guntering thread, but what do people do with unused calf hutches? Every yard you go into there's a few fired in a corner. Iv five here that im moving around the yard 20 years id say. Was in a place today and there was easy 100 taking up half an acre. Only thing I have im my head was to cut them in half and use as a flower bed?

In fairness though, it was his mother's funeral. F*#k the heifer.

😂😂can totally relate to that …brother in law can’t figure out when on holidays or out for a night aaay for weekend etc etc I can’t just switch the phone off and forget about the farm ….i can to a point …but self employed your never fully switched off from the day job ….working from home is a great job …turn on the computer ..log in …flick screens now again …send an odd e mail etc …all whilst could be in gym …off for grub ,coffee etc

The point I was trying to make is that dairying farmers never stop. A paye worker would have rang in sick.

Nearly everyone here have milked some cold morning with a cruel hangover, or a bad flu or something else 🤔

Il never forget the morning I had started milking and must have got a bug or food poisoning or something. Stuff flying from both ends.

The bull mac cabe would have been proud of my resilience that morning

that’s for sure, I was in hospital a few days ago and they have me on painkillers and other tablets strong enough for a horse, I hit the deck this morning while walking through the calves, no choice only get up a few minutes later and keep going. You can only hope it’ll be worth it in the long run.