No maize in diet?

[westwood]

Present diet consists of grass silage, maize silage, blend at 3 kg and cake in parlour fed to yield. For various reasons thinking of going down a low input system in the future. Thinking about just feeding grass silage and cake in parlour.

What yield % reduction would there be?

Thanks

 

[dinderleat]

Don’t worry about yield worry about profit

 

[Slippery Slope]

Depends how good your grass silage is I would have thought. What yield are you running at now?

 

[westwood]

8500

 

[Slippery Slope]

So if you're going down the low input route does that mean you are going to cut back on cake / blend as well?

 

[westwood]

Stop the blend but keep the cake

 

[Slippery Slope]

Stop the blend but keep the cake

Sorry, I see you put that in your opening post!

There'd be a few on here doing your current litres on grass and cake alone but I would assume on more cake than you would currently be feeding.

When we introduced maize for the first year yields went up by about 750 litres with no other changes initially (but it was as I now know harvested too soon) so I would hazard a guess of dropping back about 1000 litres. I'm sure someone far more knowledgeable than me will give you a more accurate calculation soon though!

 

[som farmer]

work out your maize costs, factor in an extra grass silage cost, presumably using a mixer wagon ? then you will feed quicker w/out maize and blend, then divide that figure with your milk price, and see how many liters your cows can afford to drop, I expect your yield drop will be less than you expect.

 

[jimmer]

You will probably need to feed a higher spec cake to get correct type and amount of energy into them, but no need to lose milk at your yields

 

[Adam@Rumen]

Do you know the analysis of your current grass & maize silage?