Archive Article: 2001/02/23
Alan Montgomery
Alan Montgomery runs
a 300ha (750-acre) mixed
farm near Downpatrick, Co
Down, Northern Ireland.
As well as cereals and
potatoes, the farm supports
a 130-cow suckler herd, 800
breeding ewes and
1000 store lambs
IT HAS been a diverse month with us. A long weekend in Rome following Irelands fortunes in the Six Nations Championship with Daphne and some friends, is just the therapy required before main lambing commences.
This was preceded by me being talked into giving a farmers perspective at a National Sheep Association meeting on the other side of the province. Having used acetates in the past, I was unsure as to how I would embrace computer presentation technology. Surprisingly things went quite well, a good photograph with each set of headings catches the imagination better than words alone will ever do.
Despite their fleeces rarely drying, ewes are in good form with condition scoring revealing fewer thin ones than in previous years. Good quality precision chopped silage and concentrate feeding starting on time is pivotal to smooth lambing.
In the absence of fishmeal, soya inclusion has been increased. Experts tell me that with a high cereal ration and ewes in good condition there should be no loss in performance: Time will tell. Typically, the EU banned fishmeal before the legislation was in place to enforce it. I am sorely tempted to put it back on the menu.
Two truckloads of cattle have been slaughtered. They were all heifers except for a few steers that were nearing 30 months. Grading mostly R3 and R4L – U3 are as scarce as hens teeth – they averaged about £450/head before deductions.
We certainly seemed to catch the top of the market; beef prices have fallen by 9p/kg in the past 10 days. With Europe awash with beef and consumption in serious decline, more price cuts seem inevitable.
Estimates of 0.75m tonnes of surplus beef on the European market are frightening, as are proposals to limit beef production in the future. The prices that finishers have been paying for stores to go out to grass would have me believe that better things are just around the corner. *
Alan Montgomery sent cattle for slaughter just in time to avoid price falls, but he is concerned about the future impact of the European BSE crisis.