Price per head a day/week for newly weaned calves on good quality grass paddocks

[haztanllan]

Hi, We are considering getting 150 weaned hereford calves from a neighboring farm for grazing. Just have a few questions

Recommended price per head a day/week for 150 heads

paddock grazing how much area would they need a day? or kg DM a day want to keep grass quality up.

Neighbor will be providing cake and we would give it out either by feeder or snacker behind quadbike

Please feel free to let us know any other stuff we should think about

First time taking calves to graze around the fields and want some advice cheers!

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Hi.
I'm in NZ but FWIW the going rate would be NZ$10.50 - $12 /hd/week for summer grazing.
(A pound is roughly $2)
They'd eat between 2.5-3% of their liveweight per day in drymatter terms, so a 300kg calf = 8kgDM of good pasture

Paddock area depends on your cover and the residual you want to leave behind them.

Say 8kgDM × 150 = 1264kgDM/ day less a kg of cake?? each = 1114kgDM

1 hectare paddocks @3000kgDM/ha they'd leave 1900kgDM residuals, or 1750kg residuals without the cake.

Hope that's a good starting point!


.... and welcome to TFF

 

[e3120]

I'd expect an acre to graze at least 5 recently weaned calves, if they're getting hard feed as well. That's assuming some form of paddock grazing, though I can't be bothered with shifting all my batches daily.

Trouble with planning stock this size is that the grazing platform needs to evolve significantly through the season (appetite and grass growth at opposite ends) and grass can get sick and unattractive quickly. I usually play a few tunes with the fert spreader, fence off for few bales to freshen up and gain more area from finishers.

 

[Little squeak]

Which country are you in? If it's the UK learn how to spell Neighbour then we arn't confused