The dairy boom.Can we officially say its over

Sub 100 fine if you don't take on a load of debt and have some reliable help available if needed.

80 cows and a 20% replacement rate so 16 heifer calves and 16 maidens kept all other calves sold at 2 months say would require 135 acres in a non derogation scenario which is a possibility, so 150 acres as a minimum isn’t a million miles away from the potential reality of it.

Organic dairy may still be an option for anyone looking to get in. It suits a smaller Herd size too

All fine and well but what is your bottom line??

plenty of lads have made good money milking 60 cows or less in the past but imo you can forget about that going forward with all the new red tape and a piss poor reward for all the extra work and headache

But it's a full-time job Vs part time.

I remember years ago that John O' Shea said on the Late Late. "Irish food will be coming from the third world whether Irish farmers like it or not".

I was young at the time but it stuck in my head. I know it's called the developing world now.

You can't just blame Europe because the UK are shutting down farming too.

That's my point. You can have a decent job with beef but with dairy you are tied to the place. So you can do 20 hours a week beef farming and 40 hours a week in a job or you can do 60 hours a week dairy farming. Works out the same money so it's just down to personal preference imo.

What is your total investment in setting it up? (Not what you are borrowing).

Also, you haven't factored in any replacements into your calculation

Secondhand parlour,tank,feeding setup and additional 45ft of slurry storage to give me soiled water storage and 18 weeks of slurry storage

Have €100k worth of stock to sell to buy dairy stock..would that not be enough to get started with 50-60 cows?

👍👍not trying to poke holes in what your doing ….fair dues for giving it a go ..2/3 years ago I’d of said full steam ahead but all the regs and banding etc combined now with high interest rates have changed the landscape

Ya sorry maybe I wasn't clear. what I meant was you would need that stuff going into milk as in having a tanker agitator ability to stack bales fast etc. .....obviously pit silage and bale making contractors all the way ...my point was that you could try keep things tight and in-house if money was tight and get contractors to give you a hand if the money was there

Ya all good but what's your costing ... I know much better return but are you willing to only break even or maybe a loss for 5_6 years . You would need to have a lot of infrastructure in place already to get away with 1500 a cow. ....but I think you do a good bit of that sort of work anyway if I'm thinking of the correct poster

Love when people say that "can't see you pulling it off",..drives me on to make a go of things even more!,..33ha of owned ground here 26ha for a milking platform,all ground is all good limestone ground,with good fertility and mostly reseeded,I have a quote from pearson's for a new 12 unit swingover and feeding system for €60k + vat..10 units and the feeding system are tams eligible,..Have a specialist who removes and fits secondhand hand parlours giving me a ball park of 30k for a used setup

Have 600m of farm roadways on the farm already,terra services will charge €5000 for a complete piping/drinking setup but I reckon I could do alot of that myself with a mate who has pipe sinking gear

I rear 30-40 calves here every year as is so there would be plenty scope for keeping calves till they are are old enough to sell

My main concerns are about buying in replacements?..tb?

There factory is only 15-20 from me would leave live easy to get call outs or spairs

Generally best to operate a closed herd. Especially if you are going to be depending on being able to offload younger animals.

Nothing bought in here. Maybe the odd bull in the past when cows weren't going into calf. We tend to rear everything to the factory, or near enough. But even then we have been locked up once or twice in the past and it's a bit of a pain in the bollix.

Just for reference on your other costs. We did a good bit of work here about 10 years ago for the end of quotas - when things were a cheaper as regards getting building done. Put a few extra units in the parlour, a slurry tower/tanks and put some cubicles into what was a loose straw bedded shed. It probably ran to in or around what you are talking about per cow today from scratch. I think that when K.G. is questioning whether you can do it, he means whether you can get it done for that price.