Failing badly at this Dairy lark

Bullocks wrote: »

Is consolidating all debt into a longer term loan an option to allow yourself some wiggle room to live .
I think you're not really failing just dealt a crap hand . Was the panic to get you home farming just to get the €250 a week and did you not know about this before you took over ?
I would be inclined to make the father pay any outstanding bills he ran up out of his €250 .
How bad would it effect you if you stopped paying the meal bill or contractors and used other mills and contractors ?

Aska wrote: »

Hi All,

This could be along winded exercise but I am not looking for pity, advice more so and probably a good kick in the nads to help me realise my fate. This had been brewing for some time now and it really started to hit home in the ’holiday’ thread on here.

I’m 39 now, I came back home to farm 4 years ago, just before I turned 35. For the past 15 years I was working on farms in Cork & New Ross and Arklow for little pay (this was all when I left school and Ag college so we are talking from ’95-’00. Then I went and began driving trucks started with a cement mixer and then I progressed onto the artic’s and doing UK & Ireland for the likes of Nolan’s etc.

So I am an only child and 4 years ago there was a mad panic to get me back home, I knew I would have to go sometime but I really wasn’t sure when and I had always been informed that there wasn’t enough in the place to have me back, Of course years earlier the auld lad wouldn’t take early retirement, no sir, he was too stubborn for that. But in the latter years before I came back he actually did feck all, the mother milked the few cows and fed the calves etc while he sat on his arse and drank, if I am honest.

I had my own house a few hundred yards up the road but my savings were diminishing fast due to the last haulier I worked for, when he had no work he sat you at home with no pay and mortgage and bills to be paid so that don’t take long to eat in to your reserve.

So I take over in April ’11 and that’s when the fun began. I was informed by himself that there was nothing owed, you’ll make a great tidy living etc. and all that BS, well that was the beginning of the lies.
Stocking Loan for €10000 was overdue and was now almost €11000,
Silage from previous year was unpaid €3600
Merchant fees from previous years I assume were €14000 plus change (you know one of these accounts that was never paid off in full from year to year)
another contractor owed a couple of grand for work like cleaning sheds, slurry, silage bales….

Bank overdraft was €8000, this was maxed out to the limit also so as you can imagine there was NO money in the account, and 28 cows for milking, so that cheque was a real eye opener.

The woman in the bank did her best and gave me a spanking new bank account for the farm while also giving me an €18000 loan that I get to pay back over the following 5 years so that the stocking loan and overdraft on their old account is cleared.

Solicitor also informs me that I must pay him €250 a week till he hit pension age (occurred in Sept ’13)
So as you can imagine, trying to run two houses with utility bills and VHI for them and giving that waste of space €1000 a month out of a creamery cheque of 28 cows was a complete joy.

Here’s where the fun really starts when you look deeper, he sold 3 sites over the years 2 for €25000 each when the boom was just beginning and then a further site for €75000 when things were flying in the building, however the only shed that was put up in the last 41 years was a 3 span open hayshed, no concrete just pillars and sheeting on roof and one length down the side. Purchased a slurry tanker in 2004 but that was placed over 5 years so it wouldn’t really eat into the land sales., no fencing, lord no. he loved the reps back then as you just let the bushes and briars be your fencing on boundary ditches, no roadways put in during the 45 years he is there, to give you an idea, there is one particular field, it’s in the block but it’s the furthest away, well the cows walk through one field and into another then mosey through that field into the one I speak of, however if they would like a drink they come back to the previous field for the trough., you really couldn’t make this up, it’s a pure disgrace.

Where did the money go all those years you ask, well it went on beer and fags, that’s it, no holidays, he was too miserable to bring the mother away, didn’t buy new cars or anything like that, in fact the main silage field is 19 acres, it has not been ploughed since 1981 and silage is cut from that EVERY year, I have that lined up for this year to be done, but that plan could fall asunder damn easily. Of course as soon as some muppet like myself takes over you have to listen to crap like, ‘you need to build more sheds’ ‘you need to reseed or you will have nothing’ etc… So I put him through the bin in the kitchen one day, had the mother not bet me off of him with the brush handle I think I would have either killed him or hospitalized him that day, Every day (and this is a horrible thing to say, but it’s the way I feel), I pray that he is going out the front door feet first the following day.

Why am I thinking I am not going to succeed…. Well I have over €3800 going out monthly on loans, add to that, esb on two places bi-monthly, VHI of almost €450 for them each month (I have NO insurance, apart from something that’s included in the FBD farm insurance) and a mortgage of almost €1000 (herself works in Tesco and only brings home approx. €330 a week but pays child minder and food and has her own loans too), last month’s milk was €8151, so yes it looks like I have a couple of grand left after them few things are paid, however when you see that the Oil company, the merchants for Fert & Dairy nuts to name but a few then you realize that come the end of the month I would be lucky to have €100 left in the account, at this moment in time I have €45 available since the 19th of last month, and that has to do me till the 17th, so this si what I am getting at, this is a regular occurrence each month, the merchants would be owed nearly €10000 between them, 33 acres of Pit silage cutting is still owed from a few weeks ago, and these are the good months, Granted €1600 of the monthly outgoing is for 6 months in the summer, the bank did it that way rather than €800 a month for 12.

I just don’t know what to do anymore, most days you would rather be dead than face that place, I don’t mind the cows at all, milking them is fine, sure 55 cows in a 6 unit can be boring at times but it’s manageable, if only some infrastructure could have been applied over the years, lack of roadways is crucifying me and with no money I can’t see that changing anytime soon. We have a lot of road frontage so getting help bringing them on the road is a real pain too, I tried bringing them along the back this year, cut open a way through the river and it works fine but if it rains you best get back on the road since the roadway down the field is just the field, not stone etc.)

In a few years I will be in my mid 40’s and I can’t see myself going to the bank then looking for large sums to maybe do roads or sheds or even a milking parlour as I’d be in my 50’s before it’s done an paid off and even then I only have a 3year old girl at the moment, I wouldn’t like to leave her the same mess as I inherited when she grows up and if she has any sense at all she will stay away from this mindfield, ‘cause come that stage in life, where is the money going to be coming from, I won’t have made it I feel.

Maybe the best option is to set the entire place and go back driving? There are a lot of dairymen (3 joining me alone) in the area and tillage is big too, I really don’t know, maybe some of you good people may have seen or come across similar situations? It’s heart-breaking because we all know people who have had no interest in farms and their folks may have busted their asses off and given them a marvellous established place only to see it fall asunder and then there are others who just didn’t bother at all with what they had and just plodded along and passed it on to the next fool (like me).

Sorry about the long winded mail, if anyone stayed to the end, thank you.

Aska wrote: »

My grass situation wouldn't be great here, I am trying to reseed a little bit by bit but anything I haven't reseeded todate with the exception of one 8 acre field hasn't been reseeded in going on 30 odd years, so some of my fields are on their last blades.

Winter feeding is another issue I had problems with, I only have pit or bale silage, no diet feeder so no mixes are possible, the cows have barley straw under them all winter so they pick some of that but this year was the worst yet for me cause the protein was a disgrace and my creamery cheque in the winter reflected that.

Aska wrote: »

Winter feeding is another issue I had problems with, I only have pit or bale silage, no diet feeder so no mixes are possible, the cows have barley straw under them all winter so they pick some of that but this year was the worst yet for me cause the protein was a disgrace and my creamery cheque in the winter reflected that.