Improving dairy herd profitability

Average costs associated with a case of mastitis or days open are commonly batted around within the industry, but what does this actually mean at individual farm level?

For North Wales farmer, Dave Brereton, using actual farm figures to formulate specific recoverable costs has allowed the business to target key areas for attention, resulting in a potential saving of £64,942 a year, or 3.64p/litre.

Following a change in the family business about nine months ago, Dave and his father, Robert, set up a new partnership and took on the 230-cow dairy at Torriad Farm, Bowling Bank.

Mr Brereton explains: “When I took on the dairy in October 2011, although I had been working on the farm, I was new to the business side. As a result I wanted support moving forward and needed to know where we were at and where we were heading.”

After a business review through the Farming Connect programme, Mr Brereton decided to take a look at the technical side of the business by getting involved in the Kite Dairy Insight Programme and has been quick off the blocks in implementing changes.

Technical review

The programme reviews the whole business and prioritises areas for attention, explains Kite consultant, Cath Ratcliffe.

“The Dairy Insight Programme ranks the main areas of the business where a farmer is likely to see the biggest savings from improving technical management and uses the farm’s actual annual production costs to calculate recoverable costs.”

Realistic targets are then agreed with the farmer and technical advice is given on how they can be achieved.

Of the seven technical areas covered in the report, feed rate, fertility and mastitis were highlighted as the top three which would bring the biggest cost saving (see table).

And the main linchpins to these factors were rooted in dry cow management, subsequent fresh cow health and forage quality.

In fact, Mr Brereton credits the changes in dry cow feeding as the main reason for improvements since October, that has seen milk production increase from 24 litres a cow a day to 30 litres a head in June. Milk fever incidence has also virtually disappeared.

Dry cow diet

“Many farmers don’t realise that dry cows are amongst the most important on your farm – and we’ve been guilty of that ourselves,” says Mr Brereton.

Traditionally dry cows were fed two different rations: a far-off diet of silage and straw and a close-up ration of grass, maize, straw and minerals. The mix was prepared every other day and there was a certain degree of sorting, resulting in too much waste.

“Milk fever incidence was getting ridiculous – to such an extent I was bottling every cow as a precaution,” says Mr Brereton. “I always thought this was something I shouldn’t have to be doing. We were also seeing retained cleansings and cows were developing early-lactation E coli mastitis, which they just wouldn’t pick up from. “

Consequently, Mrs Ratcliffe recommended a single, more consistent, high-fibre, low-energy ration throughout the dry period, including chopped straw.

“Now I leave the dry ration in the wagon for 45 minutes to ensure straw is chopped fully – we never see any wastage any more,” says Mr Brereton.

As a result, the unit has had one downer cow between October and June, and they have only bottled two cows, one of which was a thirteenth calver.

“Now, within two days of calving, cows are out of the blocks and giving 40 litres – I can’t believe how well and how quickly they have picked up,” he says.

“It only took three months for improvements to be seen and I believe improving the dry cow ration has been fundamental to these changes.”

Dry matter intakes are so important, says Mrs Ratcliffe. “Every-other-day feeding and poorly-chopped straw are common dry cow diet problems. If intakes of dry and fresh cows are down, then immunity may be compromised and this will be reflected in poor fresh cow health, impaired fertility and lower lactation peaks.”

Heat detection

Better fresh cow health has also been linked to better heat expression, with oestrus detection further improved through the use of automated heat detection.

Analysis of data through herd recording software showed most heats were being picked up at 37 to 48-day intervals, explains Mr Brereton. “This meant we were often missing pregnancy opportunities.”

Despite using Kamars and scratch cards, as well as walking the shed twice a day, heats were being missed because many cows were bulling during the night.

However, since boosting cow health and installing the automated system in February, submission rates have already picked up and Mr Brereton is serving many cows he wouldn’t otherwise have seen.

Forage quality

Boosting forage quality will be another crucial part to improving farm performance. In fact, Mrs Ratcliffe believes it is as critical to farm profitability as fertility.

“If you have a higher-quality, high-ME silage in the clamp, then you can use less concentrate and so produce more cost-effective milk,” she says.

Mr Brereton admits silage quality was not as good as it could be: “We took our second cut at the wrong time last year and as a result of waste, we’ve had to use mycotoxin binders.

“When grazing we tried our best to strip graze, but cows were continually on a whole field and not back fenced, so we had dirty pastures, which was reflected in high mastitis rates,” he explains.

At Torriad Farm, improvements to forage quality were shown to potentially yield a cost saving of more than £22,000 a year. As a result, recommendations for improving silage and grazing management have been made. This has included addressing soil calcium-magnesium balance, targeted fertiliser and slurry application, as well as plans to strip graze and ensure cows go out to a fresh bite.

“I can’t believe how well things are going in just three months of making these changes,” says Mr Brereton. “It just shows how important prioritising the cows is and ensuring you’ve got the key things right.”