Small Herd, Once a day milking

[BobbySusie]

Hi Im a new member, I have 65 suckler cows, which I farm part time, For the last 6 years. I have not made a cent in profit since. It cost s me about 10k a year to maintain.
I'm sick of farming with no money. Last week,due to a power outage,The cows broke into my bale stack last week and destroyed 80 bales on me. I was seriously considering sending them to the mart the next day.

I cant keep going making no money, I love cows and I want to farm, but for some money.

I have a cousin working that keeps 65 Danish Jerseys, Spring calving, once a day milking and does all right. I was over with him saturday, he is getting 4600l on average from 500kg of meal oad. 0.52c per litre for his milk bf 6.6% p 4.3.

He has more time for family and has no stress.

I have a 100 acres but spread out over 5 blocks, the largest at the house is 35 acres. I have good shed that was for the sucklers, that I could convert to house cubicles and I can buy a 2nd hand, 16 unit dairy master parlour. Thinking of milking 40-45 jerseys, keep sucklers on rest of the land. Once a day milking would be handy with work, But I,m not afraid of milking twice a day. I like the high milk price as its insulates from price drops a bit.

I have the place in paddocks and have roadways, would need to update water and top dress the laneways.


Sorry for the rant

Am I mad.

 

[Whitewalker]

Instant reaction, farm your 35 acres round home , rent the rest to all these high earning dairy farmers, look after your job and enjoy your family.

 

[BobbySusie]

Instant reaction, farm your 35 acres round home , rent the rest to all these high earning dairy farmers, look after your job and enjoy your family.

I have given that serious consideration, two reasons I cant bring myself to do it. 1- Im nervous of the really big dairy men and there ability to pay if the price of milk drops. I dont want to stuck with a tenant I cant shift.
2- My wife and I have begged borrowed and stole to build our small farm. No honeymoon, old cars, some cases 2nd hand clothes. I got 35 acres and a derelict house off my dad in 2008, we have the bought the rest out of savings and some personal debt. Hence the small fields! I have to make all that hardship pay a return.

 

[JP1]

I have friends who milk Danish Jerseys once a day with calf at foot. I can put you in touch if this would help

 

[BobbySusie]

I have friends who milk Danish Jerseys once a day with calf at foot. I can put you in touch if this would help

That would be great, thanks

 

[dairyrow]

be very careful your the 3rd person this week on about this. contract is king and looks your cousin on a organic contract. id have a look at preision graze system with lane ways and see if you can utilize the grass better before going to a full system change. if the big dairy cant make it to pay a rent to you. Why do it yourself if they cant make a profit you wont.

 

[BobbySusie]

be very careful your the 3rd person this week on about this. contract is king and looks your cousin on a organic contract. id have a look at preision graze system with lane ways and see if you can utilize the grass better before going to a full system change. if the big dairy cant make it to pay a rent to you. Why do it yourself if they cant make a profit you wont.

My cousin is not organic I have already spoken to a co op and the milk buyers said they are mad for as much milk as they can get. Especially high solids milk.

 

[Pieces_of_Eight]

What about rearing heifers for someone?

 

[Cows 'n grass]

I absolutely wouldn't base your budgets on those figures. I don't believe them for a minute I'm afraid, he will likely have individual cows giving those yields but not a herd average. I would work on 300kg MS in year one building to 350 by year 3.

 

[I thats it]

My cousin is not organic I have already spoken to a co op and the milk buyers said they are mad for as much milk as they can get. Especially high solids milk.

I'm surprised milk buyers are so desperate for milk, when on average you will only be producing 600-650 litres a day and most of that spring flush

 

[BobbySusie]

I'm surprised milk buyers are so desperate for milk, when on average you will only be producing 600-650 litres a day and most of that spring flush

i thought it would be an issue but I was surprised. There are 4 farmers with the same co op within a mile.

 

[I thats it]

i thought it would be an issue but I was surprised. There are 4 farmers with the same co op within a mile.

Also if its one of the co ops I'm thinking of, once you have a contract signed up your right, so long as you obey it's rules they can't give you notice

 

[Grassman247]

I think you need to think really carefully about what you are doing. Spoke to a driver for one of the feed company’s, he’s earning 40k doing 4 on 4 off.

Why put yourself through digging a big debt hole that might finish you when you could sell the cows, make yourself comfortable and go and work for someone else while you build your asset base. Renting the land to a big dairy farmer wouldn’t worry me either. Use your days off to work on the land, fencing water and laneways and then when your comfortable you could start up again on the right foot.

Failure isn’t walking away with something failure is walking away with nothing.

 

[Princess Pooper]

If you can get the figures to stack up, do the jerseys, use beef on some of them and rear the beef calves, let your sucklers go. Then do something else as well on a self employed basis so you can control workload - contract fencing, lorry driving, or even relief milking as it'll take you less than hour to milk in your proposed set up even at peak.

 

[BobbySusie]

I think you need to think really carefully about what you are doing. Spoke to a driver for one of the feed company’s, he’s earning 40k doing 4 on 4 off.

Why put yourself through digging a big debt hole that might finish you when you could sell the cows, make yourself comfortable and go and work for someone else while you build your asset base. Renting the land to a big dairy farmer wouldn’t worry me either. Use your days off to work on the land, fencing water and laneways and then when your comfortable you could start up again on the right foot.

Failure isn’t walking away with something failure is walking away with nothing.

If you can get the figures to stack up, do the jerseys, use beef on some of them and rear the beef calves, let your sucklers go. Then do something else as well on a self employed basis so you can control workload - contract fencing, lorry driving, or even relief milking as it'll take you less than hour to milk in your proposed set up even at peak.

I didnt make it clear in my first post, Im only farming part time, and would only be dairying part time hence the small numbers of cows.
I'm a qualified accountant and work 9.30 to 4 every day
Once a day milking would suit me for twp reasons- Firstly labour and secondly its a lower cost system. I reckon to convert, not incl cows would cost 100k with the facilities I have. I intend on selling my weanlings in the spring and buying yearling jersey heifers

 

[Beef farmer]

4600 liters @11% solids. Your cousin is at the top of any farming game.

Oad 500kgs solids. Take a bow son

 

[Rossymons]

100k to milk 60 cows?!

That's madness!

Rent it, carry on your work, take the money.

 

[BobbySusie]

4600 liters @11% solids. Your cousin is at the top of any farming game.

Oad 500kgs solids. Take a bow son

Im not sure that is what he gets year round but it was his last milk cheque.

 

[Princess Pooper]

I didnt make it clear in my first post, Im only farming part time, and would only be dairying part time hence the small numbers of cows.
I'm a qualified accountant and work 9.30 to 4 every day
Once a day milking would suit me for twp reasons- Firstly labour and secondly its a lower cost system. I reckon to convert, not incl cows would cost 100k with the facilities I have. I intend on selling my weanlings in the spring and buying yearling jersey heifers

Great, your accountancy will definitely be of use!!

To give you an idea, we run 80 cows (but HF, higher input/output, twice a day, pls replacements). We upgraded from an abreast parlour and 60 cows 4 years ago. The s/h 12/12 all gizmos parlour (to buy and then pay someone to dismantle and re-fit at our place) cost £23k and we had to get a part of on old shed knocked down, new shed for parlour put up, the whole thing, including some rewiring, moving the tractor generator etc came in around £50k. We did not need to change our tank, compressors, plate coolers.

Cubicles - again, you might be able to pick some up s/h, but they are not expensive. How will you stand with slurry and any relevant storage regs?

 

[BobbySusie]

Great, your accountancy will definitely be of use!!

To give you an idea, we run 80 cows (but HF, higher input/output, twice a day, pls replacements). We upgraded from an abreast parlour and 60 cows 4 years ago. The s/h 12/12 all gizmos parlour (to buy and then pay someone to dismantle and re-fit at our place) cost £23k and we had to get a part of on old shed knocked down, new shed for parlour put up, the whole thing, including some rewiring, moving the tractor generator etc came in around £50k. We did not need to change our tank, compressors, plate coolers.

Cubicles - again, you might be able to pick some up s/h, but they are not expensive. How will you stand with slurry and any relevant storage regs?

Slurry storage will be alright as I am keeping the suckler cows in same shed.

I have an outdoor slurry tank which was used to yearlings and feed them, I hope to use that as the holding yard.
I have sourced a 2nd hand tank for 7.5k, plus milking parlour. I have second hand pig feeders which I bought three years ago as a complicated way to feed finishing bulls.

What sort of revenue are you getting from the 80 cows, spring or autumn calving.