"Improving Our Lot" - Planned Holistic Grazing, for starters..

onesiedale

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Derbyshire
I don't like mobs of all the same colour, don't know why but I just don't! Makes it easier to nickname them, like young Julian there
Funny isn't it. I used to be a 'pedigree' breeder and rejoiced in seeing fields of similar coloured cattle. Now I've grown up, it just doesn't look right. In fact I now seem to look at the grass and the 'mob' before the individuals.
 

martian

DD Moderator
BASE UK Member
Location
N Herts
Funny isn't it. I used to be a 'pedigree' breeder and rejoiced in seeing fields of similar coloured cattle. Now I've grown up, it just doesn't look right. In fact I now seem to look at the grass and the 'mob' before the individuals.
I agree. When buying a bull, I always start off thinking a nice roan Shorthorn is what I'm after, then end up with some other colour, or a Hereford or Angus for hybrid vigour and I end up with a kaleidoscope herd. It makes paternity easier to guess and, as you say, ends up looking right.
 

onesiedale

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Derbyshire
I agree. When buying a bull, I always start off thinking a nice roan Shorthorn is what I'm after, then end up with some other colour, or a Hereford or Angus for hybrid vigour and I end up with a kaleidoscope herd. It makes paternity easier to guess and, as you say, ends up looking right.
Even so, all of our cattle do have names.
Meet Margaret
IMG-20200806-WA0009.jpg
 

Kiwi Pete

Member
Livestock Farmer
20210203_183734.jpg
The non-selective / "total grazing" seems to be working OK, no real surprises other than the grass seems to have a lot more guts than it used to.

Obviously they've got much better root systems.. aided because we aren't overstocked or dry, but they just bounce back so well, nice and thickly too

this has had 5 weeks and could have another 4-8 weeks to grow
 

Fenwick

Member
Location
Bretagne France
If you don’t mind me asking, presumably you can only sell carbon credits if you can demonstrate that your business is carbon negative? Does the carbon audit factor in fuel use, bought fertiliser (if used), and machinery purchases? I just read that burning a litre of diesel releases 2.7kg of co2, of which 27% is carbon. Therefore using 1,370 litres of diesel would release approximately 1 ton of carbon, roughly equal to that sequestered by 2 acres of permanent pasture in a year.

In practice thé whole thing was just Silly. You plant a trèe you stock x, you have permenant pasture you stock x. you work an hour with a tractor you émit x, etc.
 

GC74

Member
In practice thé whole thing was just Silly. You plant a trèe you stock x, you have permenant pasture you stock x. you work an hour with a tractor you émit x, etc.
I don’t know about that our climate change commission has suggested we can reduce our methane emissions by 10% if we feed our stock less......but then the chairman did say this about our worlds lowest emission dairy industry “well it’s bit like been a good whaler it doesn’t mean it’s right. Oh dear...........
 

som farmer

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
somerset
why are so many people anti farming, or is it just the fact that industry has been successful at pointing the finger of blame, at us, for climate change, or just because successive guvs have subsidised their food, by paying us subsidies, or just jealousy, or ignorance.
I don't have a problem with veggies, or even vegans, everybody is free to do what they want, within the law, in the UK, i do object to the lunatic fringes of both, having experienced some., they should not 'preach' their views to the public with such fanaticism. Even so, some of them must be intelligent people, and it's becoming more public that farming and livestock, are the solution to the carbon problem, probably the only viable solution.
So, not only do we provide the essential part of living, food, we also have the solution to the carbon problem, ag, far from being 'bad', we are actually in the driving seat. It's what can we do to change that view ?
Just to muddy the waters, there's a thread on here, official, ploughing is good for the organic matter of soil, by the scottish coll of ag, 5% increase in om on intensive farming. And on this thread, ploughing isn't found to be 'helpful', in fact in our case, it's unhelpful, the plough should just be another tool in our armoury, to be used when necessary, like to plough our kale stalks in.
 
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SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

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  • 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

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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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