East england dairy farming

[Exfarmer]

Knaptoft is hardly the East of England if that's the one in Husbands Bosworth. More like East Midlands

New micro dairy milking jerseys in a bail made out of a shipping container just started in the next village here @Exfarmer

Watching this with interest, I think they are hoping to rely on fresh sales to locals. Sadly channel Island milk has never appealed to me. I hope for their sake the local badger population is clean.

 

[O'Reilly]

That’s interesting regarding drought tolerance. I have a neighbour that has grown 15 ha of Lucerne for cutting in the same field for the last 6 - 7 years. It seems to be the only thing that stays green around here when everything else burns off. It is looking a bit thin now though so guess it needs reseeding every 5 years?

BB

It grows more than nothing, but most things need rain at the end of the day. Pure stands supposed to last five years, then need a break because of disease build up. We've had it in a grass let for ten years or more, and it's the grass that needs a reseed.

 

[sjt01]

There is a grazing Lucerne called luzelle, but you wouldn't graze a pure stand, and they don't like it that much. We haven't found it that drought tolerant either. Like most drought tolerant things, like cocksfoot, they don't die as much as ryegrass for instance, but there's not a lot of feed either. I dare say that's because I'm managing it all wrong and one of the holistic grazing crowd will have to use a string of headbanging emojis about this.

If they don't like grazing it, they certainly look for lucerne silage in the TMR - never any left in the troughs. We are feeding about 5kg.

 

[crashbox]

If they don't like grazing it, they certainly look for lucerne silage in the TMR - never any left in the troughs. We are feeding about 5kg.

How do you get on growing and harvesting it? I'm interested but never done it before. Could try it as part of a diverse mix, so not as risky.

What puts me off a pure stand:
Establishment/low yields in first year?
Tap root doesn't like acid subsoil?
Specialist harvesting gear (rake?)?
Needs its own clamp?
Stalks would pierce silage bales if cut late?

 

[sjt01]

How do you get on growing and harvesting it? I'm interested but never done it before. Could try it as part of a diverse mix, so not as risky.

What puts me off a pure stand:
Establishment/low yields in first year?
Tap root doesn't like acid subsoil?
Specialist harvesting gear (rake?)?
Needs its own clamp?
Stalks would pierce silage bales if cut late?

We do get low yields in the first year, but are prepared to accept that for 5-6 years ultra low cost forage, using only a single winter herbicide and a bit of slurry or digestate. We are on chalk which is ideal for lucerne, it definitely prefers that to acid soil - you might be better off with legumes like lupins on acid soils.
We cut with our Krone grass mower, disengage conditioner. Do not move the swath for optimum quality, let the top over dry to compensate for wet underneath. If it is not drying, we use a wuffler as gently as possible.
We used to round bale it and had occasional mould probems, which got much worse when we went to mini-Hesstons. We now chop with our JF trailed, and clamp in our smallest clamp. This is the key to quality. The compaction is such that it is hard work to get the shear bucket half way in.
I am also using some in the digester, and it has replaced feed beet in our rotation. It has the lowest carbon footprint of any crop we grow (or could possibly grow).
We have a crop of winter barley, one side of the road was lucerne 3 years ago, the other not, both maize last year. After lucerne there is a visibly far better crop. It does wonders for the soil structure.
As far as we are concerned here, the biggest difficulty is terminating the crop - there is so much root that not enough glyphosate gets taken down, so it can take 2-3 years to get rid of.
On our land, I would love to grow more, but our nutritionist is reluctant to put more in the diet.

 

[Suffolk Serf]

Watching this with interest, I think they are hoping to rely on fresh sales to locals. Sadly channel Island milk has never appealed to me. I hope for their sake the local badger population is clean.

Where? I haven’t come across that yet.
I always get CI milk, absolutely delicious.

 

[teslacoils]

Even established grass is not looking hugely productive this year. Slow in the cold.

 

[Suffolk Serf]

Dairying seems to make sense in East Anglia apart from seasonal lower rainfall than the SW.
Will cows graze lucerne, is it a good feed for them?

BB

When Elveden had dairy cows they used to graze lucerne/cocksfoot leys.
It was my ambition at one time to do that but milk quotas knocked that idea on the head so I had a bash at pigs instead.

 

[Exfarmer]

Where? I haven’t come across that yet.
I always get CI milk, absolutely delicious.

they are at Stanton Chare, I believe near the old Windmill, I think if you search Facebook you will find them

 

[Dead Rabbits]

We do get low yields in the first year, but are prepared to accept that for 5-6 years ultra low cost forage, using only a single winter herbicide and a bit of slurry or digestate. We are on chalk which is ideal for lucerne, it definitely prefers that to acid soil - you might be better off with legumes like lupins on acid soils.
We cut with our Krone grass mower, disengage conditioner. Do not move the swath for optimum quality, let the top over dry to compensate for wet underneath. If it is not drying, we use a wuffler as gently as possible.
We used to round bale it and had occasional mould probems, which got much worse when we went to mini-Hesstons. We now chop with our JF trailed, and clamp in our smallest clamp. This is the key to quality. The compaction is such that it is hard work to get the shear bucket half way in.
I am also using some in the digester, and it has replaced feed beet in our rotation. It has the lowest carbon footprint of any crop we grow (or could possibly grow).
We have a crop of winter barley, one side of the road was lucerne 3 years ago, the other not, both maize last year. After lucerne there is a visibly far better crop. It does wonders for the soil structure.
As far as we are concerned here, the biggest difficulty is terminating the crop - there is so much root that not enough glyphosate gets taken down, so it can take 2-3 years to get rid of.
On our land, I would love to grow more, but our nutritionist is reluctant to put more in the diet.

Why would the nutritionist not want to put more in?

 

[sjt01]

Why would the nutritionist not want to put more in?

She did not say, but the impression is that it would be difficult to balance the diet. If you have evidence showing we could safely use more, I would be really interested to see it.

 

[Dead Rabbits]

She did not say, but the impression is that it would be difficult to balance the diet. If you have evidence showing we could safely use more, I would be really interested to see it.

I guess if you are feeding with grass silage it would be a significant amount of protein. I mainly graze it so couldn’t say what is right. It complements maize silage very well.

 

[Flat 10]

She did not say, but the impression is that it would be difficult to balance the diet. If you have evidence showing we could safely use more, I would be really interested to see it.

Dont the yanks use almost pure alfalfa for dairy cows? Often cubed or have i been mislead? I thought thats what all the dairies in the desert in the middle east used too? As an aside aren't most of the dairy farms in east anglia in the Beccles area where they get a bit more rain? Lower temps etc?

 

[sjt01]

I guess if you are feeding with grass silage it would be a significant amount of protein. I mainly graze it so couldn’t say what is right. It complements maize silage very well.

Our TMR per cow for 35 l

Maize silage 15kg
Grass silage 5 kg
Lucerne silage 4 kg
Premix (25% rape meal, 20% bean meal, 50% barley + mins etc) 3.5 kg
allowing for 55 kg grazing intake

5 kg 18% protein cake in parlour

 

[Suffolk Serf]

Dont the yanks use almost pure alfalfa for dairy cows? Often cubed or have i been mislead? I thought thats what all the dairies in the desert in the middle east used too? As an aside aren't most of the dairy farms in east anglia in the Beccles area where they get a bit more rain? Lower temps etc?

River meadows along the Waveney, which provide decent grazing and are also pretty much unploughable would be the original reason for the dairies towards Beccles.

 

[Dead Rabbits]

Our TMR per cow for 35 l

Maize silage 15kg
Grass silage 5 kg
Lucerne silage 4 kg
Premix (25% rape meal, 20% bean meal, 50% barley + mins etc) 3.5 kg
allowing for 55 kg grazing intake

5 kg 18% protein cake in parlour

I don’t see why you couldn’t significantly reduce the purchased protein with more alfalfa.

 

[sjt01]

I don’t see why you couldn’t significantly reduce the purchased protein with more alfalfa.

I think we could reduce the bean meal, but this is home grown. I am not so sure about the rape, but would like to cut this as it is the only bought in feed apart from parlour cake.

 

[DairyGrazing]

Back when they used to do UMEs figures for farms the dry farms in the East and South East were always on top. Counter to what people generally theorised. I certainly find grass easier unitise in when it stops growing apposed to it romping away at 100kg a day.

 

[Jdunn55]

Back when they used to do UMEs figures for farms the dry farms in the East and South East were always on top. Counter to what people generally theorised. I certainly find grass easier unitise in when it stops growing apposed to it romping away at 100kg a day.

Can you imagine 100kg a day for 6 months of the year though
Personally find grass easy to manage if its growing at the same speed consistently, it's when you have a week of 60kg, a week of 4 and then a week of 30 that I struggle. Even worse when it then varies between fields!

 

[JP1]

Where? I haven’t come across that yet.
I always get CI milk, absolutely delicious.

Trailer with vending machine being fabricated and that will tour local villages