Northern Ireland Milk Price Tracker

Big guy

Member
Why are so many farmers going into milk in ni, around me this last 2/3 years there’s been loads, mostly sucked cow men changing but there has been 2 cases of arable farmers starting up from scratch. Talking to one farmer recently that’s converting from sucklers to milk and he said it’s simple there’s 6times the money in keeping a milk cow compared to suckler, (don’t think he has ever milked a cow before) it turns out it was his bank manager that planted the seed in his head. Not every farm in ni can become a milk farm
 
Why are so many farmers going into milk in ni, around me this last 2/3 years there’s been loads, mostly sucked cow men changing but there has been 2 cases of arable farmers starting up from scratch. Talking to one farmer recently that’s converting from sucklers to milk and he said it’s simple there’s 6times the money in keeping a milk cow compared to suckler, (don’t think he has ever milked a cow before) it turns out it was his bank manager that planted the seed in his head. Not every farm in ni can become a milk farm

I’m one of the annoying ones that has started and going to ruin the job for everyone.
Was getting close to £600/yr to keep suck cow for one calf a year if lucky. Always had a notion of milking, DF offer made it more attractive so took the jump.
Got milk and a calf to sell now. Suck cows did fairly well last year, calves sold as bull beef early summer when price was good, so in hindsight don’t know if big pile better off, have a lovely big repayment every month now but can pump the milk out with a robot so least there is good enough cheque to cover it
 
@Wishful Thinker 's first line seems to some up the attitude of most established dairy farmers towards new starts, I asked my neighbour (400 plus cow man) if he wanted to sell any heifers, by his response you would have thought that I asked for a go on his wife. :devil:

I too have just started recently (Valentines day), I helped out on my uncles dairy farm when i was younger and always wanted my own heard (what more justification is needed than that). My father was never really that interested, but since he told me to do what I wanted with the place, I went ahead and started. We where running suck cows, store beef, sheep & rented ground out to arable/potato farmers. Plan now is to rent out a lot less ground (just use it for a reseeding programme) and use more of our own ground to run the dairy, beef & sheep enterprises.
 

Big guy

Member
In a circumstance where it wouldn’t take much to change your beef setup into milk/ sell your sucked cows and replace with milk it probably wouldn’t take massive sums of money to get into milk production, there does seem to be a good few used parlours on the market at the min, but to start from scratch, build a shed, slurry store, silage pit purchase stock and fit 2robots it would take a lot more considering before jumping on. Though maybe no more scary than building a new hen house or piggery from scratch.
 

mixed farm

Member
I think what grates with the established dairy men Is the assumption by some start-ups that all you have to do is milk the cows for an hour morning and evening and spend the rest of the day counting all the money you make. Fella told me that he was going to renovate tractors during his free time during the day when he starts milking 100 cows.
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

    Votes: 78 43.1%
  • Up to 25%

    Votes: 63 34.8%
  • 25-50%

    Votes: 30 16.6%
  • 50-75%

    Votes: 3 1.7%
  • 75-100%

    Votes: 3 1.7%
  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

    Votes: 4 2.2%

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

  • 1,286
  • 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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