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Terryglass and part of the Horan farm look out over Lough Derg across into Co Galway at the far side of the lake. Gary is relatively new to the milking game, having spent many of his younger years in the construction trade before settling down to milking in 2007 with a dairy/beef enterprise.
At the time he had about 75 acres owned and ran 40 cows with a Hereford bull. Since 2007 Gary has used AI only, with a plan to breed replacements to allow him increase cow numbers. In 2015 he milked 74 cows and this year he is milking 84. Gary is the fifth generation farming on this farm and is very much concerned with keeping the farm clean and tidy and protecting the environment.
Total land farmed is 63ha, with over half of this rented. The herd has a very British Friesian background with many of the cows bred from the Dovea AI stud catalogue of British Friesian sires, as is common enough in this part of the country. Now all sires are selected using the ICBF sire advice programme, with bulls chosen that will improve milk solids without compromising fertility and health.
When we asked Gary what were the key reasons for delivering top-quality milk he was quick to point out what has worked for him. He said: “Firstly culling. We had some mastitis in 2013 and once repeated treatments don’t work you simply must cull those cows from the herd if you want to keep cell count under control.”
Gary also explained the he pre-foams teats before stripping and drying teats and then attaching the clusters. Gary is also a fan of a long-acting dry cow tube (Cepravin) and he cluster dips before transferring the cluster to the next cow. He has two buckets in the parlour with 20ml of Peracetic acid in 15 litres of water. Another key part of the work routine according to Gary is post-spraying cows with Nanodual after milking.
The plant wash routine is based on a Kilcosan product. After morning milking, the plant is rinsed with 80 litres of cold water, then 600ml of Kilcosan detergent is circulated for eight minutes and then that is rinsed with 80 litres of clean water.
A hot wash is completed twice weekly and a descale wash is completed once every seven to 10 days.
Factfile
Farming system: in 2015 the Horan business milked 74 cows, delivering 389,000 litres to Arrabawn Co-op in a spring-calving production system. In total, the Horan family are farming 63ha (305 acres). Milk fat averaged 4.26% and protein percentage averaged 3.63% in 2015.
Terryglass and part of the Horan farm look out over Lough Derg across into Co Galway at the far side of the lake. Gary is relatively new to the milking game, having spent many of his younger years in the construction trade before settling down to milking in 2007 with a dairy/beef enterprise.
At the time he had about 75 acres owned and ran 40 cows with a Hereford bull. Since 2007 Gary has used AI only, with a plan to breed replacements to allow him increase cow numbers. In 2015 he milked 74 cows and this year he is milking 84. Gary is the fifth generation farming on this farm and is very much concerned with keeping the farm clean and tidy and protecting the environment.
Total land farmed is 63ha, with over half of this rented. The herd has a very British Friesian background with many of the cows bred from the Dovea AI stud catalogue of British Friesian sires, as is common enough in this part of the country. Now all sires are selected using the ICBF sire advice programme, with bulls chosen that will improve milk solids without compromising fertility and health.
When we asked Gary what were the key reasons for delivering top-quality milk he was quick to point out what has worked for him. He said: “Firstly culling. We had some mastitis in 2013 and once repeated treatments don’t work you simply must cull those cows from the herd if you want to keep cell count under control.”
Gary also explained the he pre-foams teats before stripping and drying teats and then attaching the clusters. Gary is also a fan of a long-acting dry cow tube (Cepravin) and he cluster dips before transferring the cluster to the next cow. He has two buckets in the parlour with 20ml of Peracetic acid in 15 litres of water. Another key part of the work routine according to Gary is post-spraying cows with Nanodual after milking.
The plant wash routine is based on a Kilcosan product. After morning milking, the plant is rinsed with 80 litres of cold water, then 600ml of Kilcosan detergent is circulated for eight minutes and then that is rinsed with 80 litres of clean water.
A hot wash is completed twice weekly and a descale wash is completed once every seven to 10 days.
Factfile
Farming system: in 2015 the Horan business milked 74 cows, delivering 389,000 litres to Arrabawn Co-op in a spring-calving production system. In total, the Horan family are farming 63ha (305 acres). Milk fat averaged 4.26% and protein percentage averaged 3.63% in 2015.
This year 13 farming families compete for the Overall title in the NDC/Kerrygold quality milk awards.
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Gary also explained the he pre-foams teats before stripping and drying teats and then attaching the clusters. Gary is also a fan of a long-acting dry cow tube (Cepravin) and he cluster dips before transferring the cluster to the next cow. He has two buckets in the parlour with 20ml of Peracetic acid in 15 litres of water. Another key part of the work routine according to Gary is post-spraying cows with Nanodual after milking.
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