Dairy farming

What about keeping a few less cows and keeping the cattle on to stores or finishing.
Maybe not the poster boy teagasc method and maybe not as profitable but less labour intensive and less investment needed.
A few dairy farmers doing that round me actually. 2 I know are really big framed Holstein x Angus and the other is the more new Zealand friesian x Jersey x teagasc x a few Angus, the first 2 describe it as holding money together the bonus on the Angus helps a lot, the other struggled this year cost a lot of money I think.
 
Going back to an earlier post by you bruceythom you were on about heating milk on a timer in the morning,would you be able to tell where is this post I cant find it ?
 
Going back to an earlier post by you bruceythom you were on about heating milk on a timer in the morning,would you be able to tell where is this post I cant find it ?

Not sure where it is. Anyway, quite simply, a wheelie bin can be got for around €50, a milk immersion €200(ish) and a plug timer for about €15. €265 for a milk heater that's easy washed.
 
We are in the nitrates deragation but only just usually around the 180kg mark I think at year end if i got a Lad to take a bit of slurry would that be an option to get out of the deragation ??...
 
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Yeh that's defo the easiest way. Is that 180 figure an estimate on what stock numbers you had up to end of Oct? If you happen to of sold stock since you could possibly squeeze under 170, but you'd want to be dam sure of your figures.
 
We are in the deragation thing now with a good few years but our advisor wants us to stay in it of course , I was thinking if we could find someone to take slurry we could get out of it. Not easy to find I would think . It's a costly enough piece of paper !
 
We are in the deragation thing now with a good few years but our advisor wants us to stay in it of course , I was thinking if we could find someone to take slurry we could get out of it. Not easy to find I would think . It's a costly enough piece of paper !
Are you actually going to move the slurry or just spread it on the home farm.??
 
We are in the nitrates deragation but only just usually around the 180kg mark I think at year end if i got a Lad to take a bit of slurry would that be an option to get out of the deragation ??...

Another thing to remember is that next year , if you export slurry to stay under 170 , you will treated the same as if you are in a derogation . Eg , you will need to spread your slurry by a low emissions method .
So , no great advantage for you to change from what you are doing , unless you are reducing stock numbers long term.
If near the tipping point , reducing stock numbers in time , for future years is the way to go , or , increasing your land bank by the necessary amount. The latter may not be easy .
 
Just don't buy any fleckvieh bulls. They'll murder you. AI is the way to go.

ITs fleckvieh you have isn't it on an indoor 365 system isn;t it, thus they are being well fed with meal I guess. What yield and protein on average are you achieveing on how much meal if you dont mind me asking.

I guess an average fleckvieh weighs 700ish kg, a big castle of a holstein fresian cross would weigh the same.
 
What is a good average for kilos of milk solids sold per cow? I think that is the only way to correctly compare the merits of different cow type.
 
ITs fleckvieh you have isn't it on an indoor 365 system isn;t it, thus they are being well fed with meal I guess. What yield and protein on average are you achieveing on how much meal if you dont mind me asking.

I guess an average fleckvieh weighs 700ish kg, a big castle of a holstein fresian cross would weigh the same.
About 5500 litres at the minute, on a ton of meal(barley) and ad lib grass silage. I think it'll not be hard to get to 6000 ltrs tbh some cows haven't calves in 18 months and that's purely from poor decision making.
Bf averaged 4.2 and pro 3.6 last year over 12 months. With some better cubicle beds and another 500kgs of meal I'd like to get over 7000 litres. Mainly from having more cows over 3rd lactation and lasting that bit longer.
 
About 5500 litres at the minute, on a ton of meal(barley) and ad lib grass silage. I think it'll not be hard to get to 6000 ltrs tbh some cows haven't calves in 18 months and that's purely from poor decision making.
Bf averaged 4.2 and pro 3.6 last year over 12 months. With some better cubicle beds and another 500kgs of meal I'd like to get over 7000 litres. Mainly from having more cows over 3rd lactation and lasting that bit longer.
Does an indoor herd doing that milk volume actually pay? I always taught lads needed the 8-10K litres per cow to be making money.
 
Does an indoor herd doing that milk volume actually pay? I always taught lads needed the 8-10K litres per cow to be making money.
Well not really much pays right now does it. 6000litres with no extra feed is easily achievable imo. You could get far more if you tried to push them which I may try for in the future but I'll just have to wait till I have a say in the matter
 
What is a good average for kilos of milk solids sold per cow? I think that is the only way to correctly compare the merits of different cow type.

Depends on production system, but on a grass based farm feeding 600-800kgs concentrates, a realistic figure of over 400kgs would be considered average to good.
Our aim here is to get our cows to "deliver" their weight in Kgs/Ms on less than 800kgs meal. We're not feeding that much meal yet, but we will be very soon.
 
Just going back to the parlour feeders again I could leave the the feeders and just replace the auger and bin or should I replace the lot when I am at it ? ....
 
Just going back to the parlour feeders again I could leave the the feeders and just replace the auger and bin or should I replace the lot when I am at it ? ....
Get a big enough bin when you're at it. Have a 5t one here and it gets empty quick enough, shaould have got a 10t one. Grant of 40% and the vat back makes it handy enough money. Don't think you can get the grant when replacing bits of the feeders.
 
That's serious volumes you have scoff, what feeding rate do you give them and is it individual feedes you have ?
 
I’m running at 795kg of fat and protein,with a 305day average of 10200 litres and a rolling of 11970,I feed very hard so my culls are generally good money,apart from this year.:tdown:
Holee fuuke that is some production. Is that twice a day or do you love milking so much you do it in the middle of the day as well.
Herd average of 510 kg here, 6250 litres, started calving 15th Jan and dried off for the last two weeks.
 
Just going back to the parlour feeders again I could leave the the feeders and just replace the auger and bin or should I replace the lot when I am at it ? ....
Price up new and see what it would cost after grant. No grant on upgrades though.
 
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