Farmer Focus: Dutch visit showcases out-of-parlour systems
Gary Yeomans © Richard Stanton Unfortunately, my father passed away on 26 January after a short period of ill-health due to a failing heart.
He was an outstanding stockman, who was quiet and unassuming and did all he could to help my sister and me throughout our lives.
Thanks to everyone for the messages of support and the great turnout at his funeral last week.
See also: Read more from our Livestock Farmer Focus writers
Dutch goat study visit
Jess and I have been on a short goat study tour to the Netherlands.
Nearly all the farms we saw had adopted out-of-parlour systems feeding concentrate to yield.
This does away with the need for a mixer wagon and feed passages.
We felt the Dutch sheds, which were completely full of goats, seemed very intensive compared with ours, which have plenty of fresh air thanks to the space for feed passages.
What was interesting was the kid-rearing systems, which were fully insulated and had heated rearing sheds like pig buildings.
They used plastic panel walls, which are not as cold as steel or concrete and slatted floors under straw bedding.
We have been kidding a lot of goats at home now and have implemented an idea we saw using intermediate bulk containers (IBC) for initial kid pens.
We cut the front and top half of the IBC away. Then we add a heat lamp in the top and bedding made of shavings. This creates a dry warm, draught-free and easy-to-clean environment to train kids on to the automatic feeder.
Our vets are hoping their goat farmer clients will record weights and other information on kid health, to establish some parameters and target growth rates.
Monitoring calving
The Welsh blacks are due to calve from the middle of the month, and we have purchased a tailhead-activity monitor, which should send us a text message when calving is imminent.
The challenge will be, as we only have one monitor, choosing which cow we think is going to be calving next.
Local arable farmer Colin Phillips had a day hunting in Monmouthshire on a horse as part of a bet recently.
Having not ridden for more than 30 years he did extremely well and even jumped several fences.
It was a pity the huntsman came off and broke his leg so the day finished early.
Gary and Jess Yeomans run a herd of 700 milking goats across 100ha, which supplies a local cheese factory. They also own a small pedigree Welsh Black suckler herd to graze permanent pasture.