Certified Angus beef

OP you need to register with the scheme. For this bonus you have to pre book the cattle. It's not completely set in stone. You have to indicate a factory you intend to supply. You cannot really bargain on base price when supply date comes along. However it more or less a no brainer for you

Problem with AA cattle is an awful lot of them have a very poor growth rate. Because if this it can be hard to get them to a decent slaughter weight. I think that the AA and HE schemes have minimum slaughter weight for bonuses to apply. As well they will struggle to finish before late autumn.

Two year old heifers could be a better option but they can be expensive to buy.

Ideally if finishing cattle you need s mixed bunch where they will finish from July, with most gone by late September. From that on grass LA's limited power to finish cattle.

You would need Angus or HE cattle to be 300kg+ in Feb/March to have a good chance to finishing at year end. Bullocks would be as good an option as heifers.

always los of debate around AA/HE v continentals ... but once a lad is making money that is all that matters. you will hear various bad and good news stories on AA especially on weights.. but given numbers of AA calves born each year there are a lot of 'small/poor bulls being used on 'poor' dairy cows so zero change of weight.. I know one dairy farmer who brings his angus heifers from calf (from good dairy cows) to slaughter. He would normally slaughter females averaging 20 months. he does a job lot for roughly 25 heifers so finishing off grass in autumn. He goes direct to one of factories but gets price to match bonus etc. this year. he hit an average of just over 1200 which he was happy with as low input

I used to do them but I wouldn't keep them 2 years. I'd finish them off grass in October.

there are a few factors that don't help the angus from dairy... firstly the heifers being used & the bulls being used. There are too many KYA type bulls in AI and I even see a lot of Te Mania Berkley sons being used by AI companies, while these will calf easier they also won't thrive. What i noticed last year are some farmers no longer afraid to give a heifer a small hand (not rabbit type calves), which will mean better calves and they will get better paid for these calves selling on. when you see the better Angus bull calf making 350-400 last spring the lad buying needs these lads to thrive

General operatives in construction are on 30-35K/year as a basic wage now locally here. I know in the above example i gave 40K but that is before tax after tax its 617/week. I would not consider that outlandish money to be earning. In reality you need a second income to survive. Add a spouse earning 31K and they only have 500/week into there hand. That is an income of 1100/week coming into a house. In Dublin at present if you are a single person on 35K/year you are entitled to a level of rent supplement, there is a lot of single young people working in Dublin do not realize that. I know i am from near Limerick and the general run of may be higher than in some area's that are well away from larger towns and cities. But living costs are higher nearer larger urban area's as well. You can also assume that your travel costs would be higher as you would be travelling 10+ miles to work and maybe 20-30 miles.

I would not consider 40K to be an outlandish income to aim for. Most factories pay that now, you may have to work a bit of OT but not a whole lot. If you have any decent sort of qualification leaving college thestarting rate is 30+. None of mine started on any less than that, now my daughter was lucky as since starting teaching she had full hours/week.

As well remember the minute you go over 40K half is going back to the government

I've had Aax heifers kill out at everything from 240 to 328 and others will have seen bigger variation.

The 240 was one of the most profitable, strangely enough but that was last July, bought in December for 350.

The variety in the breed is ridiculous.

i would do a bit with pedigree as well and agree, lads selling bulls at these prices can't be making a bob. While the export has helped move some of the poorer female stock, it has probably created 2 unintended problems... the lads buying them think there is a lot of crap here and it has actually kept some cows alive (instead of culling her) who are breeding crap coz a lad can sell the heifer for a decent price even though she is poor.

personally my view is the beep scheme is actually a better one than genomic as the weighing can help identify cows who are not pitting weight on their calves

And as a some some trader if you are writing off 2/3's of a decent car, phone and mobile phone, electricity, pay wages to the children from 14 on etc you can shield a lot of the income.

The 20k could be the equivalent of 30k+ in real income for a couple who both have jobs. 38k is the median.woeking income in Ireland, more or less on the cusp of the high tax rate. Running a drystock farm as a business as opposed to a lifestyle choice can really change a lifestyles

Low labour input is often not about capital. It depends on land type. Fencing is one of the biggest way of decreasing labour. Paddocking and water and handling facilities after that. Make decent silage in late May/ early June. High DM silage is a super feedstuff. And if DM is high there is more feed per bale. That means less bales to feed for the winter.

Use contractors for slurry and silage. Keep cattle in as few bunches as possible. I have ran stores and yearlings as one bunch from May to September. Dairy cross cattle are easier to handle than suckler's at times. Online marts has really changed the buying of cattle in the last two years I bought over 55 of my stores on line out of 60. Forget about a big jeep and trailer. For bigger lots you buy and sell use hauliers. Selling finished cattle to a factory takes less time than sling cattle in the mart

I slaughter from early July until nearly Christmas. However 3/4 are gone by late September. Buy when you see value an animal that comes in right can go out wrong and leave a margin, if they come in wrong it's hard to make a margin on them no matter how right they get out.

Tractors and machinery add to workload and time. If farming doesn't make sense without them it will not make sense with them. However you will need a tractor. In a drystock enterprise you should really only need a tractor and loader, fertlizer spreader, sprayer, land roller, bale handler( front and rear) and a handy disc mower for topping and pre mowing. Contractor will cut silage with a mower conditioner.

A drystock farmers jobs is to buy cattle that will leave a margin, maximise there weight gain on cheap feed ( mainly grass and silage) with as low inputs as possible.

A farmers only friend is his pocket as happiness is a thing called profit( as opposed to margin, output, efficiency etc).

Beef, for most is a part time payer but often full time work.

As a part time job, it's near unbeatable, add in another part time job and you can do quite well.

A relative of mine was a great handler, he isn't anymore, average at best, works in a school as a Sna, 30k for it, out the door at 3pm. Makes as much from the farm, maximize schemes, doesn't try to squeeze output per acre, a reasonable target and that's it.

You get paid near enough the same on the land for 2 hours a day or 10 with beef.

He looked at the land as a big advantage and big earner as a part-time job. Doing it "right" would have seen him hand to mouth and the place fantastic and beef per acre to kick.

Sadly the stars are more important for those running the schemes.

The devil will be in the detail. One good thing is that you will be allowed to buy inputs anywhere compared to the Glanbia/Kepak scheme. Looking at it the scheme seems aimed at encouraging lads into winter production. It's a contract based scheme so you must join before starting to supply.

Base will be virtually the same nationwide and will be the average quoted price from ABP plants that weeks. That could take 5c/kg or even more off the price, in reality. Cattle can be from 18-28 months and the same base will be paid on U16 month bulls, heifers ( again 5-10c loss) and bullocks.

While they say cattle can be from dairy or Suckler background I imagine there will be grade and weight limits.

WTF are we surprised.

True stars will be around. One of the success of stars is the division its creates within & between the breed societies. I reckon within each society there are some that are really in favour (probably lads have high stars) & those against (probably lads with low stars). The division within the society probably makes its difficult for anyone of the these societies to constructively work with ICBF as the society itself probably doesn't have an agreed point of view other than 'the stars are wrong'. Adding this along with the stars have been around for so long now the societies don't really have input or vote on decisions being made.

The frustration i would have with the stars is they appear anti stock bull and if i look at AI's the bloodlines appear to be narrowing. for example in Angus Munster have purchased a number of Te Mania Berkley sons from a number of breeders...does that mean Te Mania Berkley is the greatest Angus ever...unlikely

Yes the Off season breed bonus has been increased to 30c/kg for Angus heifers and Steers booked in before the 28th of February. This is paid for any animals slaughtered between 14th March and the week of the 16th May. There is also the added incentive that any bookings received by the closing date Monday 28th February 2022 will be entered into a draw where Certified Irish Angus will pay for your next herd test.

If you want to become a member then you can download the forms from the website and send it back to us by post or email or contact the office and we can post out a form to you.

Membership of the producer group is a once off €100 membership fee.

There’s allot of Angus for next Carrick sale

Neigbour of mine has a fair few pedigree AA and would sell bulls so many bred now that unless they are really good he just squezzs them. Alot of handy priced AA bulls about too.

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