What's going on?

Location
Cornwall
1. Feed less cake and more grazed grass
2. Not move huge quantities of cows from spring calving to autumn and vice versa
3. Fence the entire farm properly next year the amount of time and money I lost this year from cows either escaping or else being in the wrong field/wrong side of the fence (and therefore messing the rotation up) is insane!

I could actually go on
4. Pay more and therefore be able to access a better relief milker therefore giving me a break once in a while
5. Not serve cows to calve all year round
6. Keep a much better record of cow and youngstock details
7. Keep a much better eye on finances (DO NOT DEVIATE FROM BUSINESS PLAN!!!!)
8. Pay a contractor to do first cut silage
9. Make sure all cows get a long enough dry period
10. Do not buy fancy Holstein cows that need a lorry load of cake to milk.
Added one for you 😂
 

Blue.

Member
Livestock Farmer
All these herds selling up, where are the parlours for sale?
DA39F2BC-AF12-44B6-B9D0-53452415A253.png
 

som farmer

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
somerset

100% agree, currently doing 14 a week and spending a total of 21 hours in the pit 🙃 the evening milking in particular I absolutely detest just would rather be anywhere else purely because I don't get a break from them.
Been saving my pennies and going to look for a relief after Christmas in prep for calving because I don't think I'll be able to cope on my own anymore if I'm calving any number of cows too
we have a lady come in to do the calves, money very well spent, they are done, same times every day, same amount/temp milk, and she does a seriously good job, probably total cost, less than 2 or 3 beef calves, losses so far 75 ish born alive, 1 died, and that didn't look ill ! It's a job that has to fit in with you, and becomes erratic timing, and you have a lot of money tied up in those cows. You cannot do it all, been there, and ended up needing 2 sticks, the very final nail was actually trying to get a calf to suck. So stick to the money maker - cows, and at peak workload, get help.
 

som farmer

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
somerset
our nutritionist/consultant, had to give a talk to a buying group, she had crunched the numbers, and figured 5ppl increase in costs, so far, that takes some sticking, and l don't expect she is far wrong.
What l hear, labour is a huge issue, and can you blame them, loads of other jobs out there, wives/partners don't like the long dirty hours, young lad on the knacker lorry, told us he was earning £200/day ! Our p/timer, left, now on £17 hour, driving a ready mix lorry.
Basically, if you have a 500 cow herd, labours a nightmare, regs/rt getting ever tighter, if high input/output, making f-all, (according to our accountants), looking at investment needed, to comply with new regs, lot riding on the next generation, if they don't want to milk, why have the hassle ? And cows are worth serious money.
Labour around here, very scarce, we will look, but highly unlikely we will find anyone, massive estate very local, 400 full and p/time, then plus builders/ landscapers. Loads of houses going up, versus a shitty old farm job.
And unless there is some serious movement, in the milk price, more will be forced out, you cannot run on empty for long.
Our plan, cut numbers till we can manage ourselves, produce all we can, food wise, on farm, keep some of our beef calves, so if we fail RT/EA or any other a-hole, we will be able to swop over. L/lords will not invest, tenancy length uncertain, we are not going to spend a lot, that cannot be moved.
an update, the big estate is short on staff, recruitment drive on, we don't stand a chance !
their restaurant, had to close for lunch today, not enough staff ######!
 

Werzle

Member
Location
Midlands
All these herds selling up, where are the parlours for sale?
Gathering dust or scrapped, not a massive market for them i wouldnt of thought. We havent milked for years but one buildings still got a four stall step up abreast parlour and another has got a 5 aside herringbone! Just in case we go back into milkers🤣
 

som farmer

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
somerset
Is this the Emily estate?

Guy in our pub reckons they have spent about 20 million quid on the bakery alone?
have a friend working there, it really takes some believing, 1 long natural stone wall, has been knocked down, and rebuilt 3 times, owner didn't think he liked the first 2. 20mil, anywhere else, l would laugh, there probably true, did hear some of the wheat trials, didn't yield very well, 400 acres of various wheats, for trialling.
I really think it is so far from real life, it isn't possible for most people, to even start to believe the enormous amounts of money being spent. They are continually looking for property to buy, certainly bought 1 pub, with a big building plots, probably another 1 or 2. Shops, nice old houses, farms, even a tin shed, £1mil, to build a reception centre, at cary station, to greet people coming from london, for the experience, on specially chartered trains.
 
have a friend working there, it really takes some believing, 1 long natural stone wall, has been knocked down, and rebuilt 3 times, owner didn't think he liked the first 2. 20mil, anywhere else, l would laugh, there probably true, did hear some of the wheat trials, didn't yield very well, 400 acres of various wheats, for trialling.
I really think it is so far from real life, it isn't possible for most people, to even start to believe the enormous amounts of money being spent. They are continually looking for property to buy, certainly bought 1 pub, with a big building plots, probably another 1 or 2. Shops, nice old houses, farms, even a tin shed, £1mil, to build a reception centre, at cary station, to greet people coming from london, for the experience, on specially chartered trains.

A couple of the locals I bump into are well connected to it and do various works in and around the place. I'm told the bakery is a heck of a building and they've spent an insane amount of money on it and it doesn't yet have any equipment or staff in the place? I never know what to make of all these tales but when you drive past the place it does make you wonder if some of them are true.
 

easy farming

Member
Livestock Farmer
Love to know what state the dairy industry would be in and the milk price IF everybody had carried on with the friesian cows ,all year round calving and cake, grass and quality grass silage. It seems to me that the people peddling various systems,feeds , breeds and machinery have earnt more than the dairy farmer and knackered the job trying to reinvent the wheel.
The dairy industry has ended up with a crossbred cow that nobody wants, an image of pollution,neglect and alot of worn out expensive iron.
Who wants to calve cows all year round? Once you are used to having either Christmas or Summer holidays off you are very unlikely to go back to AYR.
 

Smith31

Member
Many of my friends are ex dairy farmers, they were forward thinking, worked extremely hard, invested in machinery and modern buildings, they built up profitable businesses, which was their downfall, not the milk price or regulations.

Family members simply refused to leave the farm or be bought out, this resulted in uncles, aunties, nephews and neices all working together causing friction, until the brains behind the operations left and soon after the dairy side went too.

High property prices, new family members entering the farm business via marriage, combined with other family troubles are what is causing the closure of many agricultural businesses not just dairy in my humble opinion.
 

som farmer

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
somerset
A couple of the locals I bump into are well connected to it and do various works in and around the place. I'm told the bakery is a heck of a building and they've spent an insane amount of money on it and it doesn't yet have any equipment or staff in the place? I never know what to make of all these tales but when you drive past the place it does make you wonder if some of them are true.
ollie, double what you think, you might get closer.
while it has brought a huge amount of money into the local economy, along with the guvs housebuilding project, what will it do in the future, one day, the newt, and all its off shoots, and there's a limit to how many houses can be built, will cease. The farms won't be let out, the newts houses, definitely not 'affordable', the money train will stop.
 

Werzle

Member
Location
Midlands
Who wants to calve cows all year round? Once you are used to having either Christmas or Summer holidays off you are very unlikely to go back to AYR.
Well you say that but i recently spoke to a friend with a 600 cow autumn calving herd who was talking up AYR calving to spread the massive almost unbearable workload of block calving 🤷‍♂️
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

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Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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