All stock are now in their winter quarters. Fingers crossed, there shouldn’t be any dramatic changes over the next two months.

The in-calf heifers returned home in mid-December, after what was one of the more extended grazing seasons to date. Their year at grass was similar to the social life of my youth. Late going out and late coming back.

One group of cows will be out-wintered on forage rape. A decade after the last foray into brassicas, forage rape will be grazed this winter. With this in the mix, I’d hope to be able to stretch fodder supplies until May if needs be again.

The cull heifers were sold last week too. They were one of the most consistent loads produced here. While prices were behind last year, they were still better than the winter 2016 price.

Sampling of all sorts has been done over the last few weeks. Blood, dung, silage and soil. This is routine at this stage and allows us to get a handle on how mineral levels are in soil and stock, check for parasites and assess silage quality.

It’s all extra information that helps when it comes to making work plans and can often aid in reducing the workload and inputs required. It allows you to make decisions without breaking a sweat.

Silage samples

To be honest, silage samples are taken to get rough guidelines on the quality of the fodder in the yard. There’s no overly complicated diets involved for any stock. The results were interesting.

The cut from early May had a DMD of 75.6%. This was from a field grazed well into December. As it is an awkward spot to get young calves out of, the intention was to get an April cut, but the lack of growth in spring saw that plan tweaked.

A sample taken of silage made in September wasn’t far behind this with a DMD of 74.3%. Meanwhile, the October cut had a DMD of 68.4%. This was on par with some of the main-cut silage made here in the past.

Blood samples were taken from a selection of cows in both grazing locations. The first year we did this, a copper deficiency showed up in the bloods from one group and this was backed up by a low copper reading in the soil samples where they were grazing too. Once we knew the problem, it could be rectified.

Dung sample results revealed minimal fluke and worm present in the cows so after consulting the vet, using the results and visual assessment, a decision was made to dose only about a dozen of the cows for liver and rumen fluke.

These are some but not all of the younger cows that were on the out farm. The in-calf heifers will get the same treatment, so less than half of the herd calving down will get a fluke dose.

Reduction of routine dosing and animal treatments has been a big part of the herd health plan. This reduced a lot of yard work with these animals. All young stock got a fluke and worm treatment and a few more dung samples will be taken in a month’s time to see if there’s any further action needed. This is particularly important for the bulls going for finishing under 16 months.

Annual soil sampling to monitor pH and phosphorus and potassium levels allows any deficiencies to be made up before they become a problem and if indexes are high then only straight nitrogen is used.