Farmer Focus: Milk solids holding up nicely to meet demand
Colin Murdoch © Jeff Holmes It seems no time since the clocks went back, and now we’re thinking about Christmas. I retreated to the office to write this and left my wife, Kathryn, tangled up in fairy lights for the tree!
We’re fully in winter routine now with everything settled inside. The weather can still bring its issues, with the temperature swinging between -4C and +14C this week alone.
However, we vaccinate all calves and, touch wood, this has kept any respiratory issues at bay so far.
See also: How a high-yielding dairy herd hits 1,000kg milk solids a cow
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I say everything is inside, but I’m forgetting about the sheep. For the first time in about 10 years, we’ve taken in some lambs to try and reduce covers.
They’ll hopefully disappear just into the new year before they get too much of a taste for the winter wheat.
This month, I’m keeping my head down and saying nothing about the milk price. Milk solids are holding up nicely, even as ration changes come into play.
A small amount of the caustic wheat has been passing through the cows, so we’ve tried putting it through the roller mill. The jury is still out, but it was a slow process.
Jerseys always seem determined to prove that good things come in small packages. With input costs still high on every front, strong components and demand for the product remain our saving grace.
We managed to get calf sheds and calving pens mucked out onto stubble last week during the frost and, with a few dry days in a row, it’s nice to see slurry tanks all empty.
This should see us through into next year, especially as our contractor has taken delivery of a huge new tanker with a boom.
This will make shifting slurry from here at the dairy, over to the tower where our in-calf heifers are, much easier.
There’s been plenty of discussion recently about the Future Farming Investment Scheme and how the Scottish government’s selection process was carried out.
I’m a bit embarrassed to say we were actually successful in our application.
Rather than any big ticket items, I decided to go for a few smaller items such as electronic weighing equipment and cameras for monitoring livestock, which should hopefully increase efficiency.
As farmers, we should remain proud of what we do and with the knowledge that even when policymakers seem intent on constantly kicking us, the public still need what we produce.