John Glover
John Glover
John Glover milks 140 cows
on his 52ha (130 acre)
county council holding near
Lutterworth, Leics. The
business is run in partnership
with neighbouring tenant
Mark Wilks, with dry cows
and youngstock kept at Mr
Wilks 32ha (80 acre) farm
AT last we can sell some barren cows. We have 12 booked in for next week and while this is very useful there are another 12 we would like to move before housing.
We did manage to sell two cows a month ago on the casualty scheme. After deductions, the cheque for both of them came to £350 – about half of what we would have expected had we been able to sell them before their condition became a welfare problem.
This winter we will have over 300 cattle to feed and we are slowly building up feed stocks. We clamp grass silage, maize silage and wheat in a crimped form, but each year one feed does not turn out as expected.
Last year, we had a problem with crimped wheat. We were late harvesting it, used a different additive and a mistake was made with the application rate. The result was a lot of spoilage and too much wheat thrown away, but we knew it was poor quality and could ration accordingly. This year we made sure wheat was cut on time and we used our original additive, so fingers crossed.
When you finish a problem clamp you always think that opening a new one will solve any problems and milk production will rise again. This was the situation as we finished a clamp of silage, which was mainly last years second cut and had fed well.
But at the back of the clamp was a selection of cuts from different years and milk production fluctuated slowly downward as they were fed.
When we opened this years first cut we expected to see an increase in milk but nothing changed. It would seem that the grass silage was not the real problem, we had just assumed it was.
The maize silage appears to have an acetic fermentation. It looks fine and is stable, but is not palatable to cows so intakes are falling along with milk yield.
This maize clamp was opened just as foot-and-mouth started and I cannot remember a sample being tested at the time. The diet has now been changed and rock salt is offered along with sodium bicarbonate to reduce acidity. *