Reducing culling rate to 10%
MINIMISING UNPLANNED culls through herd management and disease prevention means a culling rate of just 10% in Roger Hancock”s herd and his vet reckons this is reducing costs by 13,180 a year.
Mr Hancock runs 125 cows at Lodge Farm, Blaby in Leics, and is selecting most culls for planned events, such as old age or yield. Of last year”s 12 culls, only three cows were sent away as casualties, whereas eight were culled for old age.
His vet Peter Orpin calculates that this low culling rate means culling costs are 12,327 for the herd, when the farm”s results are put into the British Cattle Vet Association”s health planner. If it had an average culling rate of 22% a year its culling cost would be 25,508 a year.
“Mr Hancock”s success is due to identifying problem cows early and getting rid of disease risk factors at source. It results in low incidences of mastitis – just 10 cases a year – and lameness. It also produces good fertility,” says Mr Orpin, of the Park Vet Group, Whetstone.
“Many producers assume the cost for each cull is the same, but there is a big difference between a cow going in early lactation, as an emergency case of toxic mastitis or death, and a planned cull at the end achieving maximum sale price.”
At Lodge Farm, Mr Hancock”s secrets for low culling rates include feeding for health and giving individual attention, producing long-lived cows with an 8000-litre average.
He admits he does things the old-fashioned way, including calving heifers at nearer three years of age than two. The aim is to ensure they are well grown and ease into herd life better.
“We might have a higher rearing cost to get them there, but once calved we spend less time and money on later health problems, such as lameness, or trying to get them back in calf,” says Mr Hancock.
There are 32 heifers due to calve in September this year, but they are not all needed as replacements. Keeping them all would compromise management, says Mr Hancock.
He will calve 18 into the herd to allow for any unplanned culls – due to a bad outbreak of mastitis for instance – and choose nearer the time which ones to keep.
However, he says it”s not easy to select cows for culling. “But they have to be culled when it”s costing us more to keep them going than they are worth. This year we have one aged 12 years and another 16 years to go.
“We start thinking in March/April about which cows to cull in the year ahead and decide not to serve them again.”
A preventative approach to health is also part of Mr Hancock”s policy. The herd is vaccinated for bovine viral diarrhoea and leptospirosis. It has no digital dermatitis and has avoided nutritional lameness, such as sole ulcers, by paying attention to the diet.