staring a dairy farm

yo!its_yoyo

F.D wrote: »

I'd like some more info as well please, I bet you will have to have the green cert to qualify, i wonder what the terms and conditions are?

the green cert is simple to get. Go to clonakilty and keep a farm diary for a year, poof your done.

Humpty Dumpty

Any farmer looking to get back into dairying has to look at robots. Two new lely centers set up in the south. The cost for 1 or 2 robots is very close to conventional cost but think of the benefit, lifestyle, production, animal health and the list goes on and before you say it, it works very well in grazing, i have seen many a robot farm working on grazing and they are all working very well.

irishh_bob

Humpty Dumpty wrote: »

Any farmer looking to get back into dairying has to look at robots. Two new lely centers set up in the south. The cost for 1 or 2 robots is very close to conventional cost but think of the benefit, lifestyle, production, animal health and the list goes on and before you say it, it works very well in grazing, i have seen many a robot farm working on grazing and they are all working very well.

yeah , i can just see an old cow walking in ( volluntarily ) a half a killometer to the parlour to be milked , twice in one day :rolleyes:

Humpty Dumpty

I have seen it on a farm near me. His cows are achieving 2.5 times a day during the summer and 3.4 times a day during the winter period. I think there is an open day there in april.

whelan1

robots are grand but you still need to be there , theres always one that doesnt go in etc

F.D

Humpty Dumpty wrote: »

Any farmer looking to get back into dairying has to look at robots. Two new lely centers set up in the south. The cost for 1 or 2 robots is very close to conventional cost but think of the benefit, lifestyle, production, animal health and the list goes on and before you say it, it works very well in grazing, i have seen many a robot farm working on grazing and they are all working very well.

Agreed but the capital cost is a major factor and also to get the mamimum out of the system it needs to be milking 365days a year, other problem is crossing the road to the other fields. but if i had the money i would put one in and zerograze the land across the road and have the cows out by day and in by night,

Humpty Dumpty

I have spoke to a farmer . There is an open day on his farm in nenagh next thursday. Is conventional quote with building and collecting yards was €30000 more expensive than the two robots he put it. On the robot farm near me he had to cull 1 ackward cow and he has never had an issue with cows entering robot. 100% correct on public road issue. But as a cost issuen even if they were 25% more expensive, Lifestyle, spec . Better than getting battered by wind and rain in kilkenny

John_F

chalk it down its better than the shack in kilkenny thatl be used for glanbia to set a lower milk price and say 'hey lads if we can do it ye can'

any sign of a demo around cork coming up? theres a big thread on the britishfarmingfourms.co.uk website about a lad putting in a lely, very interesting

blue5000

Well FD have we pis**d you off yet? Have you made your mind up yet? I have to say I'm a bit biased against dairying, I stopped milking when the price of milk I was getting went below what my father was getting when quotas came in back in 1984/5.
If you still want to get into it try looking at a partnership with a large established farmer who maybe wants to start taking it easy and has no family interested in taking over. Perhaps you could use your land for rearing heifers/ beefing male calves.

You have said that you have 2 blocks with only 60 ac round the yard, you are talking about zero grazing, what part of the country are you in and what co-ops would you be thinking of supplying?

The reason I ask what co-ops are near you is
1) there is a significant difference between the worst co-op and the best co-op in this country.
2) Energy- It takes an awful lot of energy to cool milk and then dry / process it. If the co-op you are thinking of supplying doesn't have a gas supply (cheap energy) they are, to put it bluntly F***ed.

You sound like you are fairly young and keen to milk cows, It is a good time to get in as almost every dairy farmer in the country is fed up at the moment, bad weather, low prices, working for nothing etc. and looking for other options. I would suggest think about the partnership, it has a lot of advantages but it takes two to get on, it won't suit everyone though.
Hope there is some food for thought here:)

Humpty Dumpty

Kingston refrigetation got the franchise for Lely. Give them a ring about open day. It is the future lads. Even on grazing

whelan1

a lad a few miles from us has set up a system a bit like the one in kilkenny , only reseeded the land from corn in the autumn , no calving sheds just the bare minimum , milking parlour with open sides - plenty of fun in this frosty weather:D - plus no grass growth ...... dont think this is the way to go lads

_Skitso_

Hey all,

I am going into dairying and will be commencing production Feb 2011. The site I will be producing on is an out farm at the moment, 15 miles from "home" but intented to move to this outfarm in the future! We are doing suckler/beef and sheep at the moment! The block of land is 64HA all in one block!! There is absolutely no sheds on this site only a old cattle pen and crush!! We will be using this land solely for dairy cows and will be running followers and making silage on other farm!! I hope to milk over 200 cows and will be crossbreeding!!

We will be building sheds, putting in roads, water and parlor this summer. The farm is an open exposed farm in Co. Roscommon which is quite late but we hope to solve this with reseeding.

I am very interested in what people think of the robot system for a grass based spring system, I have done no costing on robots and know very little about them. Infact I'm interested in anyhthing people have to say!!

I have 105 maiden heifers bought, mostly BF but some more holestein than other!! Any suggestings on what bulls to use??

Please fire ahead with any questions I'll do my best to answer!!

F.D

hi blue 5000 no i'm not put off yet but its no harm gettin honest opinions, dont know what coop i will be supplying yet i am in co offaly, two of my cousins are in milk milking over 100 cows each, there lucky enough to have a big block of land around the yard and my grandfather is still milking too only milking 30 but runs a tight ship and still earns his few pound all suppling lakeland dairys, its actually my grandfather thats pushing me towards it, in my late 20's so its now or never as far as i'm concerned. have experience in milking and with lely robots too, skitso fair play to you for given it a go. heres a few questions anyway.
Is there any costings done to show if high numbers of cows grass diet no meal is more effective than lesser cows,
either grazing and on high amounts of meal, and hopfully high yields
housed inside fed a forage based diet, again higher yields to reflect this
Would the margins be the same?
just curious as teagasc seem to be pushing the first option very hard where as in uk and europe it seems to be more the latter?
whats the prices like for winter milk, if you were to go robotic would the returns pay for it?

F.D

maybe we're thinking too small together lads seen this on the british forum
http://farmingforum.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=28414

btw whelan i have to agree with you on the kilkenny site idea sometimes the bare minimum is not the answer especially if it makes the job harder

pakalasa

When you look at the scale of some of these large dairy units starting up (like in the above UK article) you'd think that the smaller guy is finnished. However when you look at the labour ratio it works out at around the 100 cow mark per worker. It was the same with that farmer from the north that started up in south Dakota, he also had around the 100 cow per man aswell. All Mexican or similar. ( I wonder how many of them were legal ?)

By that reckoning the typical Irish system, small family owned farm and one full time worker (the farmer) using contractors to do all the heavy work and using cheap grass to the maximum. Then dairying should have a good future in this country. Better than either beef or tillage IMO.

irishh_bob

F.D wrote: »

hi blue 5000 no i'm not put off yet but its no harm gettin honest opinions, dont know what coop i will be supplying yet i am in co offaly, two of my cousins are in milk milking over 100 cows each, there lucky enough to have a big block of land around the yard and my grandfather is still milking too only milking 30 but runs a tight ship and still earns his few pound all suppling lakeland dairys, its actually my grandfather thats pushing me towards it, in my late 20's so its now or never as far as i'm concerned. have experience in milking and with lely robots too, skitso fair play to you for given it a go. heres a few questions anyway.
Is there any costings done to show if high numbers of cows grass diet no meal is more effective than lesser cows,
either grazing and on high amounts of meal, and hopfully high yields
housed inside fed a forage based diet, again higher yields to reflect this
Would the margins be the same?
just curious as teagasc seem to be pushing the first option very hard where as in uk and europe it seems to be more the latter?
whats the prices like for winter milk, if you were to go robotic would the returns pay for it?

the uk is a net importer of food and as such has a year round demand for liquid milk which is why high input - high output is the norm in dairying circles , very different story in ireland

teagasc are certainly focusing almost entirely on the low cost means of production and while considering the climate we have , this makes a huge amount of sense , its a pity they give so little voice to those with alternative styles , personally , im a believer in whatever works for you , i dont buy into the view that having 200 cows producing 150 thousand gallons of milk off grass is nesscerily a better lifestyle than milking 80 cows all year round on two tonne of meal with the same output , in my view thier has to be more work with 200 , they all have to be tb tested , watched when calving down , calves then reared , the relevant amout of fertilizer purchased , the relveant amount of slurry storage put in place , this is not new zealand where you can be sure of a decent growth every spring and entirley sure of a decent summer , new zealands biggest problem is not enough rain where as irelands problem is too much of it , low cost production is fine but we need to maintain a balance and not aim for something which is incompatible with our climate or other realities in our country

John_F

irishh_bob wrote: »

the uk is a net importer of food and as such has a year round demand for liquid milk which is why high input - high output is the norm in dairying circles , very different story in ireland

teagasc are certainly focusing almost entirely on the low cost means of production and while considering the climate we have , this makes a huge amount of sense , its a pity they give so little voice to those with alternative styles , personally , im a believer in whatever works for you , i dont buy into the view that having 200 cows producing 150 thousand gallons of milk off grass is nesscerily a better lifestyle than milking 80 cows all year round on two tonne of meal with the same output , in my view thier has to be more work with 200 , they all have to be tb tested , watched when calving down , calves then reared , the relevant amout of fertilizer purchased , the relveant amount of slurry storage put in place , this is not new zealand where you can be sure of a decent growth every spring and entirley sure of a decent summer , new zealands biggest problem is not enough rain where as irelands problem is too much of it , low cost production is fine but we need to maintain a balance and not aim for something which is incompatible with our climate or other realities in our country

here here

clockplane

On the subject of increasing farming income, one way is biogas capture from animal slurry, which can be used to generate electricity. I’m a final year student conducting a study into sustainable energy from biogas, but there seems to be a lack of awareness of the technology.
I am conducting a survey to see how much awareness of the technology there actually is, and you’d really be helping me out by filling out the my survey. It shouldn’t take more than a minute, click here.
One example of this technology being used by farmers to increase income is in Denmark. The slurry is collected from the farmers by truck and brought to a central facility where, along with biodegradable green waste, it can be used to generate biogas and then electricity.
The remaining waste (the digestate) left over from this process is redistributed to the farms from which the manure was taken for land spreading. The digestate has the advantages of:
· More inorganic nitrogen is available to plants (therefore better growth).
· 80% of the odour is removed from the slurry.
· It helps farmers adhere to the nitrates directives.

If you’d like to read more about biogas, check out these links:
http://www.anaerobic-digestion.com/html/on-farm-anaerobic-digestion-an.php
http://www.epa.ie/downloads/pubs/other/viewpoints/EPA_Viewpoint_Anaerobic_Digestion_Sept 06.pdf
http://www.afbini.gov.uk/index/services/services-specialist-advice/renewable-energy/re-anaerobic-digestion-intro/re-anaerobic-digestion-plants.htm

F.D

clockplane wrote: »

On the subject of increasing farming income, one way is biogas capture from animal slurry, which can be used to generate electricity. I’m a final year student conducting a study into sustainable energy from biogas, but there seems to be a lack of awareness of the technology.
I am conducting a survey to see how much awareness of the technology there actually is, and you’d really be helping me out by filling out the my survey. It shouldn’t take more than a minute, click here.
One example of this technology being used by farmers to increase income is in Denmark. The slurry is collected from the farmers by truck and brought to a central facility where, along with biodegradable green waste, it can be used to generate biogas and then electricity.
The remaining waste (the digestate) left over from this process is redistributed to the farms from which the manure was taken for land spreading. The digestate has the advantages of:
· More inorganic nitrogen is available to plants (therefore better growth).
· 80% of the odour is removed from the slurry.
· It helps farmers adhere to the nitrates directives.

If you’d like to read more about biogas, check out these links:
http://www.anaerobic-digestion.com/html/on-farm-anaerobic-digestion-an.php
http://www.epa.ie/downloads/pubs/other/viewpoints/EPA_Viewpoint_Anaerobic_Digestion_Sept 06.pdf
http://www.afbini.gov.uk/index/services/services-specialist-advice/renewable-energy/re-anaerobic-digestion-intro/re-anaerobic-digestion-plants.htm

seen as your studying it can you give any ideas of the costs of a farm type setup to gererate its own electricity, what size farm would you have to be to justify it? ie how much manure per year to make it viable? from what i have read in the past in europe they tend to be run more on maize or solid manure more than the slurry that would be gererally available on most irish farms

clockplane

The study I am conducting is examining the feasibility of a centralised digester. I basing it on a Danish model, where smaller farmers come together in a co-op, along with utilitie’s company and invest in a centralised facility together.

Generally on farm digesters tend to be on intensive farms. I haven't come across a farm smaller than 300 head of dairy cattle, on which a digester is sustainable. Adding maize and similar vegetable crops, or biodegradable municipal waste improves the biogas yield.

A rough online calculator can be found through the link below.

http://www.anaerobic-digestion.com/html/biogas_calculator.php

thanks for filling out the questionnaire.

F.D

Any body go to the Lely Open day to see the robot setup if so what were yer thoughts, missed it myself couldnt get off work

Sam Kade

pakalasa wrote: »

It was the same with that farmer from the north that started up in south Dakota, he also had around the 100 cow per man aswell. All Mexican or similar. ( I wonder how many of them were legal ;

They are all legal as he had to provide so many jobs depending on the amount of investment he was making, I am sure it was 1 job for every $500,000 invested. It was a package deal that they were doing in SD to get foreign investment in and to create jobs. Obviously the farmers relocating and SD gained out of it. The minimum wage in SD is $7.20/hour so that rules out any idea of Mexicans working for $2/hour. Some states in the US still have no min wage but not many.

pakalasa

I worked in the US for a while. It was in the New York area. I worked with a lot of Hipanics, they were all illegal. Once they didn't get in trouble with the law, nobobdy bothered them. A good few illegal Irish too I might add.

portoe1

Hi All,
I am in the same situation u would pay 220k for 2 robots or second hand about150k!! I am on my last year in collage and im interested in starting a dairy farm. I have the land but nothing else would need to put in roads, sheds the works. I would be doing all the work with my dad putting in roads building sheds, concrete work everything. I have done the figures and looks good from what i can tell .
Does anyone have an idea the price of heifer calves under 2 months!?
Or the best place to get the finance for the envestment!?

Would appreciate any advice all would be taken on board gladly
thanks everyone!!

Indubitable

portoe1 wrote: »

Hi All,
I am in the same situation u would pay 220k for 2 robots or second hand about150k!! I am on my last year in collage and im interested in starting a dairy farm. I have the land but nothing else would need to put in roads, sheds the works. I would be doing all the work with my dad putting in roads building sheds, concrete work everything. I have done the figures and looks good from what i can tell .
Does anyone have an idea the price of heifer calves under 2 months!?
Or the best place to get the finance for the envestment!?

Would appreciate any advice all would be taken on board gladly
thanks everyone!!

You already posted this in another thread

portoe1

would any one be able to help me!! im getting into dairy farming and over a few years i would hope to get to be milking 150 cows on average grazing ground!! i would be looking at only keeping replacements. would anyone have a rough idea how much land i would need for grazing ground only and how much land over all i wound need??

whelan1

i have 300 acres this includes silage ground and enough ground for replacements and 150 cows

portoe1

Do you carry manny replacements!? Do you take one cut of silage or two!? do u grow any other crops what type of land do u have!?

whelan1

our land would be heavy ... do 2 cuts around 110 acres first cut and 60 -70 second cut also do maize only had 10 acres this year had 20 other years . have 40 1-2 year old replacement and around 40 under 1 . also have 15 pb angus suckler cows and bulls/ followers

portoe1

I would be thinking of having 150 cows and replacements grazing on heavy land but cutting silage and maize on top quility land. Do u think i would be ale to do this on 230 acres or is that unrealistic!?

dar31

portoe1 wrote: »

I would be thinking of having 150 cows and replacements grazing on heavy land but cutting silage and maize on top quility land. Do u think i would be ale to do this on 230 acres or is that unrealistic!?

i think you got it backwards, whats the point of having your most valuable asset, grazed grass, on the poorest land.:eek:
your numbers are just about do able, but you may forget about the maize.
why dont you buy in the maize on a t/dm basis, let some one else take the risk on it, its way to expensive if it goes wrong.
200 lu (150 cows and 50 lu repl) on 230 ac assuming that them ac are not adjusted, bring that back to 215 ac adj = 2.29lu/ha should have no prob at that stocking rate

whelan1

but be very careful in years like the last few every acre is needed . i am doing whole crop wheat this year instead of maize

portoe1

My reason for doing this is that 160 acres are in one place the heavy land and 70 acres is about 2 miles away the good land!! How much grazing land would u set a side just for the 150 cows for the milking season!?

portoe1

whelan1 wrote: »

but be very careful in years like the last few every acre is needed . i am doing whole crop wheat this year instead of maize

Why have u chosen whole crop wheat is there not a big yield difference maize and whole crop wheat!?

whelan1

cost and the crop last year was brutal

browned

why bother with maize r wholecrop at all?
why not have an all grass system, and fill in any shortage of grass at the shoulders with ration. its much easier to feed ration to milking cows than maize or wholecrop i'd imagine.
also since your outfarm is only 2 miles away it'd make better since to keep it in grass as you could graze it with dry cows at the start or end of the year. if your roads are quite u could even walk the cows there

whelan1

we too have an outfarm 2 miles away we rear the youngstock and sucklers there and also cull cows, wouldnt dream of walking milkers there

portoe1

If u wanted to have a high yielding herd do u not think u need to have more then one type of feed in the cows diet!?

whelan1

portoe1 wrote: »

If u wanted to have a high yielding herd do u not think u need to have more then one type of feed in the cows diet!?

yes i agree , i was toying between triticale or whole crop .....was considering buying in maize either

portoe1

the only way i could see people making a good living from dairying is with high yielding cows and just feeding grass wuld never get u there!! how did u find the 2 crops!?

whelan1

found the maize made a big difference , but was too dear last year for the milk price ,time to change to try some other crop

portoe1

what sort of yield did u get from the maize last year!? what would u suggest to put into there diet!?

browned

we too have an outfarm 2 miles away we rear the youngstock and sucklers there and also cull cows, wouldnt dream of walking milkers there

it wasn't the milkers i was suggesting walking to the out farm, it was the dry cows. instead of keeping them inside on silage u could have the late calving dry cow out on grass in feb and march. or alternatively you could have them grazing grass in the autumn after they are fully dryed off. it would reduce your silage requirement and reduce labour. but it was only a suggestion for a medium yielding herd.

if its high yielding cows that your planning to milk then surely u'll be able to have a higher stocking rate than was suggested as you'll be importing a large amount of feed onto the milking platform. surely u could increase the stocking rate to 180-200 cows if your outfarm will be used for growing maize/wholerop/triticale.

John_F

browned wrote: »

why bother with maize r wholecrop at all?
why not have an all grass system, and fill in any shortage of grass at the shoulders with ration. its much easier to feed ration to milking cows than maize or wholecrop i'd imagine.
also since your outfarm is only 2 miles away it'd make better since to keep it in grass as you could graze it with dry cows at the start or end of the year. if your roads are quite u could even walk the cows there

depends on the cow, a good crop of maize is a cheap crop as your getting tonnes and quality, its when the crop isn't good the price rises. maize silage is cheaper than 2nd cut silage on a unit of energy basis (teagasc figures from 06 or 07). Maize is a good balancer at grass with short fibre. Alot harder to fill the diet with ration as more risk of stomach problems, maize has the fibre and energy. a high yielding cow eats only marginally more than a low yielder but needs a hell of alot more energy in every kg of feed... so depends on type of cow and prices of other feeds. Walking cows 2 miles on a high ration and silage diet will lead to foot problems

browned

depends on the cow, a good crop of maize is a cheap crop as your getting tonnes and quality, its when the crop isn't good the price rises.

depends on the system as well. the poster never said if he was planning on milking seasonally or milking all year round. he also didn't say if he was planning on milking high or average yielding cows. my reply was to your typical spring calving senario where imo ration would be much more suitable to the system as opposed to maize. it would be more flexable and cost effective than a crop of maize.

Walking cows 2 miles on a high ration and silage diet will lead to foot problems

already explained in the previous post that it wasn't the milkers i was suggesting walk to the outfarm. i was suggesting that he could walk the dry cows to the outfarm, graze them for a month in the spring before saving for silage and walk them back home for calving. he could do the same in the winter. it would cut down the cost of wintering.

if he was to walk the milking cows to the outfarm it'd mean that he'd increase his milking platform in the spring and autumn by 70 acres, when would reduce his demand and thus reduce his need to feed silage and ration to his cows.
all this is dependent on the type of cow he plans to milk of course, as this obviously wouldn't work with a high yielding type cow

John_F

browned wrote: »

depends on the system as well. the poster never said if he was planning on milking seasonally or milking all year round. he also didn't say if he was planning on milking high or average yielding cows. my reply was to your typical spring calving senario where imo ration would be much more suitable to the system as opposed to maize. it would be more flexable and cost effective than a crop of maize.



already explained in the previous post that it wasn't the milkers i was suggesting walk to the outfarm. i was suggesting that he could walk the dry cows to the outfarm, graze them for a month in the spring before saving for silage and walk them back home for calving. he could do the same in the winter. it would cut down the cost of wintering.

if he was to walk the milking cows to the outfarm it'd mean that he'd increase his milking platform in the spring and autumn by 70 acres, when would reduce his demand and thus reduce his need to feed silage and ration to his cows.
all this is dependent on the type of cow he plans to milk of course, as this obviously wouldn't work with a high yielding type cow

In my view the cow is the system i.e. high yielding = high input. . . low yielding = lower inputs. Appologies, didn't see the other post, when you said

"also since your outfarm is only 2 miles away it'd make better since to keep it in grass as you could graze it with dry cows at the start or end of the year. if your roads are quite u could even walk the cows there"

then i thought you meant milkers.

@portoe1 have you costed the operation and if so at what milk price? What type of cow is in your mind?

browned

prob should have made it much clearer in my first post.

In my view the cow is the system i.e. high yielding = high input. . . low yielding = lower inputs

your right but you can get exceptions.
i know farmers getting yields of 16,000-17,000 in primerally grass based systems. it helps that they are excellent grassland managers and have exceptional breeding programmes.

i think the farm itself should be the defining factor on the system/cow employed on it. the soil type, yearly grass yield and farm size will have a huge factor in the type of cows that u decide to milk. for example jersey crosses are more suited than large holsteins to heavy ground as u won't have compaction issues.

portoe1

I am in the middle of costing everythin from the start up to production stage!! I would like to milk a cross between holstein and norweigian red!! does anyone have any comments on autumn cavling!?

whelan1

we calve 10 months of the year , the autumn calvers always milk better but have more feeding ,also have the risk of summer mastitis

portoe1

which do u think is more suited to higher yielding cows autumn or spring calving!? would u not make a saving on fertiliser cost in the summer with an autumn cavling herd!? do u have a big herd or why do u have such a long calving period!?