Among the buzz words at the moment seems to be the phrase “a thirst for knowledge”. I would like to think that I have always had a thirst for knowledge. I certainly want to continually learn more and improve, and I assume I’m not alone.

I recently had the privilege of bringing some of my cattle to one of the BETTER Farm Beef Challenge NI mart demonstrations and talking about my stock and my system of farming.

It was great to see a big turnout of farmers at the events, and most of them had a real desire for learning how to improve their farm.

There were some superb speakers at the events, who delivered their message in a clear and concise manner. Those who I talked to afterwards were very impressed with these events.

There was one farmer, in particular, who stood out for me. He was in his 70s and was wearing a hearing aid, but he still had that thirst for knowledge. He came to me afterwards and asked me to write down some of the AI bulls that I was using so that he could go home and tell his son.

It brought it home to me that if you have that desire to improve, age doesn’t matter.

Visit

Earlier the same day, I had the farmers from the BETTER Farm Programme in the Republic of Ireland out for a look around my farm. They are a super group and, certainly, have the desire to learn more. The questions from the group came thick and fast.

I sometimes wonder what I have to show to other farmers or why anyone would want to come and look around my farm. I’m only an ordinary farmer trying to make the best of what I have.

The only thing that I can think is that I am not prepared to sit on whatever knowledge I have. I am keen to implement any modern technology or innovation, although in a lot of cases I have to adjust things to suit my own circumstances.

I also am involved in a CAFRE business development group (BDG) and I have no doubt that the members of the group all want to learn. However, at times I get frustrated that they are not grabbing this knowledge by the scruff of the neck and using it now, to improve their business. I sometimes think our adviser should be pushing them more.

View

But I am starting to change my view on this after some interesting conversations with members of the group. One of the them has made a real effort to set up paddocks with the aim to improve his grassland management.

There is another farmer who is starting to see the merits in finishing cattle more quickly, rather than going through a store period. He is probably wavering a bit in recent weeks and might need some encouragement.

However, the one who has impressed me the most is a farmer who has looked at his calving index and now realises that his cows need to be calving every 365 days. He has had problems with heat detection, but he has moved to using PRIDS in an effort to get the cows back into calf.

Impatient

All this leads me to think that I’m just being impatient with the group members and everybody works and moves at different speeds. But it frustrates me to see people sitting on knowledge and slow to implement positive changes on their farms, especially when these changes will actually make them more money.

I would encourage all farmers to be open to advice and taking on new ideas.

Going forward, probably the next big challenge for the BDG advisers is to move from offering advice to actually seeing that advice translated into changes on farm.