- Location
- South Molton
All things Dairy
- Thread starter Cows 'n grass
- Start date
- Location
- North West
Staff inform me there are a couple of drys want to be getting back, (grassing 8 miles from home) Rock up with trailer after milking, and presented with this
View attachment 980953
I know your pain too well!
You no dates for them?
More to life
Member
- Location
- Somerset
uses the same calander as you
pine_guy
Member
- Location
- North Cumbria
Yes, not that it matters as wouldn’t have had time to bring them home. Pretty much one man down for all August from a team of 3. Bloody school holidays
- Location
- M6 Hard shoulder
If you haven't got time to bring calving cows home I think you need to reassess your dry cow strategy
- Location
- North West
We don't have any calving's from the 8th of December until the 8th of Jan. If we end up with a lot of staff with young kids we won't calf any in August and they will have to take their summer holiday then!
- Location
- M6 Hard shoulder
Weve always tried to have less calving over Christmas and always used to stop serving for 2 fortnight periods for calving around May and October 1/2 terms, worked well to get some family holidays but used to play havoc with the preg rate
pine_guy
Member
- Location
- North Cumbria
Agreed. Was a bit tongue in cheek. We are under staffed and looking. It’s the lack of grass and carting feed in instead of them grassing at night that’s taking up too much time. But we are also trying to leave cows away longer as we get milk fever problems if they are in the calving paddock at home for any length of time. Next year should see the majority calve in two blocks starting April and September.
pine_guy
Member
- Location
- North Cumbria
Oh and I got my burger and beer by the camp fire eventually 
Jdunn55
Member
- Location
- Helston, cornwall
Happy cows
- Location
- North West
Get the gas on that feed barrier when you get the chance.....in 2025
Jdunn55
Member
- Location
- Helston, cornwall
They can say what they want but I would rather they were eating silage than standing around (or worse lying down!) on concrete waiting for me to finish milking, ai cows, feed the calves, wash down, wash the calves buckets out etc before being let out, in the evening they don't get any buffer feed as they can go straight out to grazing but in the day they have to cross the road and unless they have a magic way to get cows across a road on their own without an underpass, cattle grids or paying someone to stand there for 2 hours while they wonder up the driveway as and when they're milked then this is the next best solution imo...
Jdunn55
Member
- Location
- Helston, cornwall
How do you mean? The whole lot needs replacing really as the boards are rotten and the concrete blocks are giving out :/ I might turn this shed into calf cubicles as theres a very steep slippery slope for the cows to get into it. But need to sort out my silage clamp for self feed silage first so wont be for a couple of years...
lazy farmer
Member
- Location
- som/dor border
Oh I don’t know how about milking the cows and moving them Before anything else ? If you want to feed feed. Don’t use your routine as An excuse. Ours wait 2 hrs in the morning and unless I’m lifting a foot as soon as the parlours empty cows cross the road.
Jdunn55
Member
- Location
- Helston, cornwall
It takes half an hour + for them to walk to the end of the drive which is the perfect amount of time for all the sh!t in the parlour to stick to the floors, walls, and stall work, by the time I then get that cleaned to an acceptable standard my poor calves wont be fed until god knows when which isn't great for growth which is vital at that stage as they're growing the fastest they ever will be and that's ignoring the fact sometimes it takes me half an hour to ai all the cows that are bulling, had 8 to do one morning
It works far, far better for me to feed a bale of silage a day than it does not to, maybe not for you and that's great but what works on one farm doesnt always work everywhere else
- Location
- somerset
self feed silage is the ultimate easy way of feeding silage to cows, or, is it ? It ceased to happen on the majority of farms, for the simplest reason, cow numbers increased, in numbers and weight, clamps didn't, so you ended up with too narrow feed faces, for the number of cows that were expected to feed, that and putting in grass way over their reach ! Which led to massive waste, pretty certain cutting out, and feeders, is a better option.
Nothing in life is ever perfect, we all have to compromise somewhere along the way, and walking cows out/in, can be a real pain, ours don't get much buffer, consequently the buggers are spread right across the field, to get in, and then they will only dawdle along, going out, some will run, others will stroll, ending up with a very slow road crossing by the time they all get there. Doesn't worry me, but the number of cars, that stop, shunt round, and go back, amuses me, 90% would be quicker, waiting !
We don't compromise on calves, we pay someone to do that, as it's block, it's temporary, and pays hands down. Calf losses are minimal, and they look fantastic, both of which mean more profit, we can sell all our calves privately, to repeat customers.
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Jdunn55
Member
- Location
- Helston, cornwall
I'm hoping to sort that by opening up one side of the clamp so cows can eat along the length of the clamp instead of the width, but need to concrete the back of the clamp first and put another clamp in somewhere for my wholecrop which is why it'll take a couple of years:/
- Location
- somerset
concerns me about the width, of a face, and spoilage because of that. We would have to build a new clamp, as our pits now away from cubicles. Having had the EA jobsworth around, any new pit, would need planning permission, and pre-start approval, by EA, on how you would deal with a 'leak', and how you would construct it, their standards/regs would put £1,000's on the cost, basically you would have to have a sealed concrete base, with an effluent drain, around the whole slab, with associated effluent tank, min 20,000 litres, and they specify type of concrete. Not sure any of ours had pp. EA condemned 2 pits here, 1 for being a stone base, the other for no effluent tank, rusted away. You need to be very careful, our pits were pre '91, so escaped some regs, but, by putting in the eff tank, he could have insisted it had to comply with todays regs.
thankfully, the indoor pits, had cattle in, no way he would have left them alone !