Short-term assistance for calving

casualguy

Is there any possible way outside of farm relief for getting a person to work for the calving season?
Such as maybe someone from the dole or maybe another farmer looking for extra work. My mother is 60+yrs of age, my father passed away & i wont be available at all times.
I have read that there is a shortage of help, but is there a way to advertise for people, such as an teagasc webpage etc.

djmc

casualguy wrote: »

Is there any possible way outside of farm relief for getting a person to work for the calving season?
Such as maybe someone from the dole or maybe another farmer looking for extra work. My mother is 60+yrs of age, my father passed away & i wont be available at all times.
I have read that there is a shortage of help, but is there a way to advertise for people, such as an teagasc webpage etc.

Try an advert on done deal their could be lads with plenty experience looking for part time work if you could be flexible with hours or days.
My advise would be to start feeding 2kg of nuts per cow a day from a few weeks before calving starts until they are out on grass.
Check cows at least 3 times a day first thing in the morning in the evening and last thing at night.
Get someone to show you how to check the cows pins for when they drop.
What part of the country are you in.
Also toplink.ie

patsy_mccabe

Suckler or Dairy? Different feeding regime, I'd say. Feed 2Kg to suckler cows and you're looking at calving problems.

whelan2

How about putting an ad up in your vets or local co-op?

The man in red and black

Good calving gate and self locking head gate. Make sure you mother is careful. Worry about my parents dealing with cows calving. Can be a dangerous job with a 600kg bag of hormones!

Who2

Get talking to your neighbours, there's always a handy young lad coming on or a semi retired farmer, in most instances they will be mad to help and earn a few quid. There's no point paying a lad by the hour to calve cows, if he's quiet he will be there for hours and if he's busy you'll be lucky if he turns up.

tanko

Who2 wrote: »

Get talking to your neighbours, there's always a handy young lad coming on or a semi retired farmer, in most instances they will be mad to help and earn a few quid. There's no point paying a lad by the hour to calve cows, if he's quiet he will be there for hours and if he's busy you'll be lucky if he turns up.

A neighbour you can trust is ideal alrite but what is a fair way of paying someone like this?

White Clover

tanko wrote: »

but what is a fair way of paying someone like this?

Not wanting to sound too harsh here but it sounds like this is what the op is trying to avoid.

Who2

tanko wrote: »

A neighbour you can trust is ideal alrite but what is a fair way of paying someone like this?

A score every now and again a bottle of whiskey at christmas, a tin of sweets now and again or maybe just return the favour be that just by turning up and helping drawing bales or a little help feeding. Even to call down and have a chat. It's hard to refuse someone if they are good Craic.

St.Senan

I don't know if the intent of the original poster was how to advertise or how to pay.  Advertising for help should be local (the Co-Op is good) but word of mouth would probably be best.  The question of payment is interesting.  How do you pay for such an arrangement and stay on the right side of the tax-man.

curioush

djmc wrote: »

Try an advert on done deal their could be lads with plenty experience looking for part time work if you could be flexible with hours or days.
My advise would be to start feeding 2kg of nuts per cow a day from a few weeks before calving starts until they are out on grass.
Check cows at least 3 times a day first thing in the morning in the evening and last thing at night.
Get someone to show you how to check the cows pins for when they drop.
What part of the country are you in.
Also toplink.ie

In Cork. Have the moocall currently, a lot of false signals last year. Would be looking for someone Monday to Friday, maybe 200euro a week, 3 meals a day. Do ye think that's reasonable?

Who2

curioush wrote: »

In Cork. Have the moocall currently, a lot of false signals last year. Would be looking for someone Monday to Friday, maybe 200 euro a week, 3 meals a day. Do ye think that's reasonable?

if you expect them to hang around 5 days a week waiting on cows to calve for 200 euro, id seriously doubt there will be a queue for the job. is there no neighbour that travels past daily or living up the road that will call in whenever needed? Ive a lad that looks after mine when calving and im not about and i do the same for him when hes not around.

carrollsno1

curioush wrote: »

In Cork. Have the moocall currently, a lot of false signals last year. Would be looking for someone Monday to Friday, maybe 200euro a week, 3 meals a day. Do ye think that's reasonable?

€40 a day are you for real

J.O. Farmer

carrollsno1 wrote: »

€40 a day are you for real

Quick PM that guy before the job is gone. The €40 a day is fantastic and then throwing in 3 meals a day on top. If you take the job before Christmas there might even be a pint in it for you.
Where else would you get that sort of money apart from the dole obviously or about half a week on minimum wage.

djmc

minimum wage is around 10 euro an hour so if you cant afford something around that maybe less hours or days might suit someone for higher pay rate that could get through some jobs that ye cant manage alone.
like two days a week or a few hours each day.
Another option could be let the farm or farm partnership with someone.

curioush

Only suggesting J.O. Farmer & carrollsno1. What do you think is reasonable? It meant it doesn't have to go through the books, the person could still get the dole on top.

simx

could you get a calving camera on the phone? you could have somebody on standby if any activity
could even connect a camera to another lads phone for him to keep an eye on, my sister can see the shed and yard at home anytime and she lives in dublin, only put it on her phone for the gallery really

curioush

simx wrote: »

could you get a calving camera on the phone? you could have somebody on standby if any activity
could even connect a camera to another lads phone for him to keep an eye on, my sister can see the shed and yard at home anytime and she lives in dublin, only put it on her phone for the gallery really

Will be getting a camera. It looks like a cousin might do the job, he's 17 & has no work.

Water John

You should do like all high flying dairy men and get in a Green Cert fella/gal for next to nothing.

kevthegaff

Water John wrote:

You should do like all high flying dairy men and get in a Green Cert fella/gal for next to nothing.

Only for ifa men and lads scratching each others backs

carrollsno1

curioush wrote: »

Only suggesting J.O. Farmer & carrollsno1. What do you think is reasonable? It meant it doesn't have to go through the books, the person could still get the dole on top.

I'm on €10 an hour after tax I think most on a farm during a busy time like calving should be on fairly similar so If a lad is there 5 days a week getting 3 meals a day he's surely going to be there most of the day so say that's 11hrs a day minus an hour and a half for breaks so 95 a day into the hand should be reasonable if the person is claiming the dole he shouldn't be on working there

J.O. Farmer

curioush wrote: »

Only suggesting J.O. Farmer & carrollsno1. What do you think is reasonable? It meant it doesn't have to go through the books, the person could still get the dole on top.

I'd say minimum wage at least but calving cows is skilled work in its own way.
I don't think you should be promoting social welfare fraud on here but even if they are getting the dole they'll get that without getting out of bed. After that it's about how much they want an extra €200.
The other thing to consider is how much is that €200 actually costing you if you don't put it through the books. That €200 is fully tax deductible so depending on your tax rate it could be nearly €400 if you are on the top rate of tax.