BEEP (Beef Environmental Efficiency Pilot Scheme)

coolshannagh28 wrote: »

More jumping through hoops for peanuts.

+1

Farmer wrote: »

I dont get the weight thing. Can't they use the mart sale weights, we'll give then a calf at birth size on a scale of one to three. Let them subtract the two and divide by the days in between whether it be 4 months or 30.

Biosecurity !!
Cattle repeatedly drawn into the mart and all driven through scales over and over. Surely multiplying the chances for disease spread.

Anto_Meath wrote: »

Hi Bass, along with my few suckler cows I also rear about 20 AAx / HEx calves, I kill them as bullocks under 30 months, they generally grade O's at around 350Kgs and come into circa €1,300 - €1,400. There is a good bit of work with them for the first fee weeks and you have to buy a fairly good calf at around €200. They have to be fit to be killed before the 1st August off grass. Would an extra €200 - €300 plus €120 subsidy justify keeping the suckler cow, I don't think so and that is the the problem.
The problem with buying calves now is the Jex influence has destroyed the AAx calf and HEx calf isn't much better either so an average calf now in the mart looks like a good one....

It is not necessarily the jersey that is the issue with AA and HE calves. At present there is a huge use of easy calving bulls. With larger herds dairy men want calves that cows can spit out. There is no issue with this if growth and final weight was not compormised as well. But dairy farmer will continue as long as farmers pay too much for calves just like they pay for JEX calves or at least take them for small money

Very hard to justify a suckler cow. You will run a calf to store unit easily on the same amount of land maybe nearer to 1.5 units. TBH buying store at 15+months and finishing them allows you to run at least two units where you would run a sucker cow if you have good land it is the way to go.

Hard Knocks wrote: »

Personally I think it’s a better scheme to the BDGS, just a pity the money is less.
I think dry stock should be included too & this would give a better understanding to the performance of bulls progeny.

There are lots of great bulls out there with poor stars because they haven’t the latest big thing in their breeding.

To me the 3 key times for weighing are birth, 100-150 days & 250-350 days.

I’ve a scales, I bought because of first KT program & find it useful for lambs also, the cost of weighing was €40 for first 10 calves back then.

If you had 10 calves @ €400 less €60 for ICBF & €40 for weighing, that’s €300 extra in your pocket

Just 1 more thing (maybe dreamworld) if you had weights could you sell from the field/yard & save a day at the mart, commission & stress on the animal & you

Very hard to get data on dairy bred beef calves. They are mostly bred off stock bulls and there treatment varies. I have seen Fr calves in the autumn vary from over 300kgs to under 200kgs all born in early spring. It is the same with all other breeds weight can vary by 40%. You go to any mart and look at stores Fr (the reason I pick them is there are less variable with regard to easy calving breeding ) at 18-20 months they can vary from a bit with 300kgs to 550 kgs.

You can always sell in the field, problem with a lot of farmers with scales selling inn the field they fail to take the difference between mart and fresh weight, the fact that buyer may have higher transport costs buying in field and lads wanting the highest price paid for cattle in the mart over the last month. Also the crap of pricing so that you can be bargained down.

K9 wrote: »

As it stands icbf are reliant on you to put a score on your cows milk ability. Would you agree that if you were to weigh your calves at 150 days and after 3 years icbf would then have a far more accurate figure for your cows milk potential. Which in turn would improve the reliability of your cows euro star value.
I’d agree that the star system has its flaws but icbf can only base it on the information that they have. Not much point criticising inaccuracies and at the same time giving out about measures that will improve reliability of figures

Listen, I subscribe to ICBF and agree to an extent what you’re saying re the data but if ICBF are relying on me in the first place to tell them about my cows performance, then you’d have to a kind of agree that’s it’s me that knows it in the first place......

K9 wrote: »

That’s not much use to the rest of us tho. Just say you used a bull to breed replacements, surely the sooner icbf can get reliable information re that bulls performance on replacement traits the better it would be for the rest of us

I thought we were talking about cows ?

Dunedin wrote: »

I thought we were talking about cows ?

Well obviously. .if bull x breeds a cow that leaves a calf 100 kg heavier than the calf out of a cow by bull y. Then bull x is a better bull for breeding replacements and his eurostars would improve

patsy_mccabe wrote: »

I've always felt that a small easily kept suckler cow that produced a good calf was the most profitable. 50 cows at 800kgs will eat the same as 80 cows at 500kgs. Just try telling that to those that produce the €1000 fancy weanling.

Id say a jersey cow is propably heavier than 500kgs
I don't see how a 500kg cow is going to produce something with a reasonable growth rate. Youd oftem see strong weanlings that weight...id say majority of cows here are 650-775 ish. Wouldnt like them any heavier or lighter than that

patsy_mccabe wrote: »

I've always felt that a small easily kept suckler cow that produced a good calf was the most profitable. 50 cows at 800kgs will eat the same as 80 cows at 500kgs. Just try telling that to those that produce the €1000 fancy weanling.

If you're finding it difficult managing a profit with the 50, would it justify aiming to try & get a larger profit with the 80? Considering the jump in labor, less time with stock so higher risk of losing stock, costs of dosing, ai/2nd bull, creep feed etc.
Could just end up chasing your tail for longer.

blue5000 wrote: »

Believe it or not NZ! The first time I heard it mentioned was at a teagasc demo in Johnstown castle and a NZ beef expert was on about it, it's their target weaning weight for cows. Can't remember what year it was, same year that the ploughing match was in Wexford.

I think they aim for something similar in the states

Realistically any lad wanting to stay in sucklers needs to be chasing 1000 euro weanlings. For that you need reasonable size cows. I’ve done the billing at 400 kg and it just doesn’t work. Decent sized cows at 650-700 kg so you can afford to put that slightly harder calving bull on. Well shaped with growth. If this year doesn’t prove anything else but the difference in quality and price then we shouldn’t be at it. Middle of the road sucklers aren’t covering themselves. It shows when the big lads doing under 16 month bulls go to the mart. It’s not pride, polling or any other rooting it’s just that good u grade weanlings with weight for age turn a decent profit for them.

High bike wrote: »

how reliable is weight for age when some lads have calves lying in the rushes for 3 mts before the register them.Was at a mart a couple of weeks ago and saw plenty 5 mt old weanlings go through at well over 400 kgs and it didn’t seem to bother lads they still bought em

And why would it bother them if they were that age. They want their animals killed under a certain age.

High bike wrote: »

how reliable is weight for age when some lads have calves lying in the rushes for 3 mts before the register them.Was at a mart a couple of weeks ago and saw plenty 5 mt old weanlings go through at well over 400 kgs and it didn’t seem to bother lads they still bought em

There was a few lads at that crack in the pedigree limousin game. Very big bulls for their age. The society payed them a surprise visit. They are no longer in the society.

Did anyone have a link or scheme details ? Wondering is this for Bdgp herds only or anyone ? Which reference year are they using ?

milligan2 wrote: »

Loads of lads registering them very late around here to get into the u 16 month market,impossible to police if they have a stock bull but some are all AI and in the Genomics scheme.
It goes to show the amount of raving info being sent into said scheme,ADG,calving interval,cow back in calf,kill out etc all skewed by false DOB of calf

Agree with you and the only one he is fooling is himself, a neighbour always had great weanling for age till he got a cattle inspection and had to register all the rushes calves and got caught under the 300day rule and a big penalty and two inspections in the following 3 years and now has ordinary weanlings in the mart.

Every extra100kg of cow liveweight requires an extra tonne of silage to over winter the cow.
It will be interesting to see what exactly is the average cow liveweight on farms