Dairy Calves 2024

Boat capacity ment to be down to 33% of last years at the minute, the powder sideline could be a way to get some extra revenue in, keep the job ticking over, it's a weird business tactic threatening dairy farmers buy off me our keep your calves, given what they'll likely pay be aswell selling them in the mart with negative bidding then dance to his tune

Thats serious if capacity is only at 33%. That puts approx 120k calves extra in the system. I know suckler calvings are back in numbers, last year they were back by 60k, dairy calvings were up by 20k. Suckler numbers will be back something similar. The big elephant in the room is where will dairy calvings end up. Will it be back on 2023, hold on last year number or dip due to nitrates. Some of the increase in numbers maybe hidden in the decline of sucklers, but age profile won't help this long-term

As always the calf with good breeding sells and repeat custom is the name of the game. Weight on the hook is dropping big time and how do we collectively halt or improve it. If we don't beef farmers won't rear calves, simples

He was buying them in our local mart the other day anyway. Don't think he asked what type of milk they drank. Of course he also swears that he doesn't buy in marts either.

The reality is he along with the rest of the calf buying crooks around the counry provide an invaluable service to dairy farmers ,where do you think the 1000 calves in Castleisland ,Gortatlea ,Listowel and Bandon mart disappear to week end week out during the spring

No doubt he provides an invaluable service to an awful lot but having a bit of manner about himself wouldn’t kill him

I doubt the VanDrie group are worried about cmr sales in Ireland. If they were they would have actively competed in the market rather than leaving it to a few calf exporters.

Put an ad on donedeal for our autumn calves 6 years ago guy came from up the country bought the lot, has came every year since and bought the whole lot each year. Never haggles on the price we ask with us he’s got on very well with them each year. Relationships are vital.

Alot of dairy farmers around here but lads will try to find herds were there's no jersey breeding. Getting scarcer now.

I watched the calf sale in New Ross Mart today just out of curiosity. BB bulls from FR cows making up to €380, while some FR bull calves went unsold, some went for €5 up to €100 for the nicer ones. Huge amount of calves there. Would prices ne cheaper there than elsewhere or is it much the same everywhere?

What where AA and He bull calves making today?

You have 2 probablys in there Bass at the end about a man that you obviously don't know. Why argue the toss over a lad 200+ kms away that anyone on here with experience of him are all of the one opinion?

I didn't see enough of them selling to give a true picture. New Ross don't have a Catalogue of the prices up on LSL, unusual.

Going to be a pile of aa he calves exported this year cos there will be a lot less fr bulls around

Seamus is a very long time in the business and has grown it into a family business, Seamus manner might not be to everyone liking and have encountered him in bad humour on several occasions over the years, but the fact is the dairy and beef industry needs calves to be shipped out of the country full stop, what is the alternative keep everything in the country collapsing the beef trade and getting a extra derogation for these calves. The shipping game is weather related and is a total headache if boats don’t sail or allow lorries on when it suits them. A calf has a value full stop and if a dealer buys he has to get a margin and the calf feeders have to get the same, we use to buy calves off a neighbour who kept increasing the prices to the locals till his trade died and he had to go to the mart where he didn’t get on as well and soon opened his eyes to the local trade he had lost, my late father and myself have bought calves off Scallons for forty years and have fell out with Seamus and have gone back to buy again, he always gets the type of calf we have looked for over that period, as Bass said about Mauty he is a bit of a rogue and we can’t say anything wrong about the dealings in his mart. Not everybody likes red wine but some do and everyone to their own.