Cows 365 Blog : milking cows

Milking cows by hand no longer a practice

cows365 — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 21:59:00 GMT

Visited Andrew Killeen farming outside Kilkee Co. Clare. We had a fabulous breakfast at his mothers house.His mum Mary Markham married John Killeen in 1956. They started milking 12 cows by hand and went up to 15 in 1987 when they got a milking machine. However they were advised to milk the cows by hand the last month before drying them off. They discontinued this procedure after two years.

Farm fragmentation in County Clare

cows365 — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 11:41:00 GMT

Finished up our day scanning in County Clare on a diary unit outside Ennis. The dairy farmer had four different locations . He had to walk cows for one mile on a road to one of his outside farms as his herd expanded . As the amount of traffic increased on the road he put up a second milking parlour on the outside farm. This type of cost is not borne in mind with when considering cost efficient milk production on many farms in rural Ireland. Farm fragmentation is a major issue in the management of the farm. County Clare is one of the finest examples of fragmentation limiting potential for expansion for cost efficient beef or milk production. I left County Clare this evening wondering what the future holds for a resilient group of farmers which are excellent stockmen with very little future where scale means everything.and with lower margins in high scale production systems they do not have a great future. Dr.Dan @ www. cows365.com

Empty cows continue to be milked

cows365 — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 13:17:00 GMT

On calls in County Limerick, one noticeable feature is that empty cows continue to be milked. Farmers are willing to persist with milking these cows over the winter months and to put them back into the breeding gap for next Spring. As empty rates are too high, the value of cull cows doesn’t warrant culling them on the basis of age and milk production and the price of milk today would justify feeding these cows. The only issue arising is that some of the co-ops may not be willing to collect the milk. Using ultrasonography, we are able to identify cows that are suitable or unsuitable for recycling to a breeding programme next Spring.

Dr Dan @ www.cows365.com