Farmer Focus: Pumping slurry out to fields costs £2k more
© Richard Stanton With calving finished, everyone has had a week’s holiday somewhere.
My partner Louise and I managed a week in Fuerteventura, where the weather was mostly dry, but being nicknamed the Island of the Moon it was different.
Due to its black volcanic rock and lack of soil, no grass is grown there, although we did see a 30-a-side parlour for milking goats, whose feed is all imported.
See also: How new slurry store sets up dairy to optimise spreading
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On arriving home, we brought the bulling heifers back from their winter grazing to the serving block where they will be kept until housing.
We were successful in getting an applicant through the Farming Connect Start to Farm scheme to work for 12 weeks.
But after he bought himself 12 big pigs – which all turned out to be pregnant – he had to leave four weeks early to farrow them.
I had hoped he would have been here through April when there was more variety of work on offer, and our breeding system would have been an eye-opener.
Breeding in the first week has been busy, but I shall give you the statistics next time.
The slurry pit was emptied with ease as access is now more direct through a new 16ha (40-acre) block we have bought.
With me mixing and measuring rates in a square concrete-walled pit, I was in contact with the man in the field, so rates were altered in different fields and his flow meter meant rates were tailored.
We had four pumps in line at a maximum distance of 3,200m from the slurry pit and up to 233m above the pit. We managed to burn through 3,600 litres of red diesel at a rate of £1.25/litre.
This equated to a £2,000 cost increase in diesel alone compared with last year. But tankering on this job is not an option, nor is ferrying it up to be mobile-nurse-tanked out, because of access.
Also, having far less traffic on (and around) the yard must work out cheaper.
Finally, all silage fields were shut up mid-April, with harrowing, rolling and fertiliser applied with new GPS and autosteer tractors.
And, yes, I am working my way around spraying fields with MCPA in order to have some control of weeds.