Grass vs cake

Their going to have your pants down with a few of them! 25kg could be £2 off plus 40p for a 4 😬

To be honest that lot had gone a bit over. Me and the Mrs had Covid after New Years and we lost a couple weeks. They should have gone off two weeks earlier.

However I sent them off to some grass keep after weaning in September as a bunch of 203 runts and I think I’ve seen them once since. Lost one lamb. 0.35p/h/W and owner checks daily and moves. Ground is watered and stock fenced. Went and weighed them and took 156 out of them, so I should think they will leave some good money despite some getting a few quid hammered off them.
 

Al R

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
West Wales
To be honest that lot had gone a bit over. Me and the Mrs had Covid after New Years and we lost a couple weeks. They should have gone off two weeks earlier.

However I sent them off to some grass keep after weaning in September as a bunch of 203 runts and I think I’ve seen them once since. Lost one lamb. 0.35p/h/W and owner checks daily and moves. Ground is watered and stock fenced. Went and weighed them and took 156 out of them, so I should think they will leave some good money despite some getting a few quid hammered off them.
Well done lad 👍🏻
 

tinsheet

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
West Somerset
Does an acre of turnips provide feed for enough stock to produce enough FYM for another acre of turnips
Not sure on that one without doing some calculations, but my system would be different to most, I grow a
Kale turnip and forage oat mix, and graze with cattle over winter.
My housed cattle provide the fym the following years crop, ive more cattle out than in (just).
Works for me.
 

Agrivator

Member
Lucky is the farm that can produce good quality stock off grass alone - regardless of the cost of fertiliser.

And you are right, home produced grass and silage etc requires land, labour and machinery. Bought-in concentrates ( used efficiently) only need a few cubic metres of storage space. And they tend to compensate for any deficiencies in home-grown grass.
And even luckier still is the farmer who has enough acres not to need to use fertiliser.

Lack of N will always affect the small farmer most. I bet Prince Charles doesn't realise that!!!!!!!
 

neilo

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Montgomeryshire

will6910

Member
Location
N.i
And even luckier still is the farmer who has enough acres not to need to use fertiliser.

Lack of N will always affect the small farmer most. I bet Prince Charles doesn't realise that!!!!!!!
I always find it fascinating reading threads on here from other farmers compared to my scale. Most people will have fields the same size as my entire farm. For me I have had in past and plan to get there again a high stock rate but high output of lambs. I have hen muck available at all times bear enough but it’s starting to not have a affect as much now as fields got sick off it. Only thing that has made grass grow well to match my grazing is about 50kg of straight nitrogen a acre. I sowed 3 500kg bags last summer and cut silage off 12 acres of my 36 acre farm. For all I use off it il try not to sow any but eventually I’m going to have to. If I run half as many sheep or even less it would get to point Itl be no point keeping that little sheep expect for a few pets around
 

Estate fencing.

Member
Livestock Farmer
I always find it fascinating reading threads on here from other farmers compared to my scale. Most people will have fields the same size as my entire farm. For me I have had in past and plan to get there again a high stock rate but high output of lambs. I have hen muck available at all times bear enough but it’s starting to not have a affect as much now as fields got sick off it. Only thing that has made grass grow well to match my grazing is about 50kg of straight nitrogen a acre. I sowed 3 500kg bags last summer and cut silage off 12 acres of my 36 acre farm. For all I use off it il try not to sow any but eventually I’m going to have to. If I run half as many sheep or even less it would get to point Itl be no point keeping that little sheep expect for a few pets around
Have you ever thought about growing beet. I have 10 acres grown for me and it produces enough food for 850 ewes (550 grazing and 300 on the lifted beet) for 12 weeks. Means that I can run a lot more ewes on my grass. It cost a lot to grow but produces a hell of a lot of beet on a small area.
 

will6910

Member
Location
N.i
Fields aren’t suited really. All ewes comes inside at Christmas or before it and be glad to get to get in out off the muck most years. Having winter grazing helps higher stock but does mean housing for good while. But also means most fields gets no grazing from start November until March
 
Just to illustrate what I was thinking about. The picture is a paddock of about 2 acres where for quite a few years we have fattened batches of around 50 lambs on hoppers. When some are sold some more are added . It's pp I don't know when it was seeded, it's never had any artificial fert. You can see from the background it's not in the sunny lowlands😄. The last lambs came off on 30th Nov.
IMG_20220116_155228_196.jpg
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

    Votes: 80 42.1%
  • Up to 25%

    Votes: 67 35.3%
  • 25-50%

    Votes: 30 15.8%
  • 50-75%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 75-100%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

    Votes: 7 3.7%

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

  • 1,294
  • 1
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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