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My wandering bull who went seeking cows in heat a fortnight ago ended up a bit lame after his escapades. This will now mean continuing AI for an extra few weeks and bringing back the young bull after TB testing.
That bull isn’t in the most convenient location to bring him back right now and the cows are close to the dwelling house for the next while so it’s a case of fingers crossed and see how many hold to the first service. It will be a good tester for me for a second round of AI.
After a number of years at finishing cattle, I look more at the fat scores than the conformation
The plan for now is hold the handful of polled Simmental straws for the pedigrees that might repeat and go with Angus or polled Hereford on any others that come in. This should mean a shorter gestation for those cows and hopefully improve the finishing fat scores.
After a number of years at finishing cattle, I look more at the fat scores than the conformation.
It’s early days yet but the fat scores on the young bulls don’t look like reaching the pre-2017 levels where they averaged 3+. Overall, our cattle would be coming in at U-3 in terms of grading.
For the last two years they have been averaging 2+ for fat. This means more bulls than I would like miss out on the Bord Bia 12c/kg bonus.
Moving to finishing our own stock was a game changer for the farm
Translated into euros this can be worth in or around €40 to €50 per animal depending on weight. A not insignificant figure.
Moving to finishing our own stock was a game changer for the farm. It has also been a steep learning curve, with most lessons learned the hard way. The first year of the venture was 2014. The consolation was it was more worthwhile than selling stores or weanlings as we had done previously.
It’s safe to say this is likely to be the worst beef price we have experienced since we started or if not it will be a close second to 2014.
The ICBF slaughter reports for the herd show a staggering difference between the prices paid for young bulls in 2014 and 2015. The average paid in our first year of finishing bulls was €3.91/kg, while the heady days of the €4.43/kg average we got in 2015 seem so far away. That price differential was very close to equating to an extra three animals sold on the previous year.
Before the €100m Brexit beef fund was announced, the price on young bulls was confidently creeping towards €4/kg and weight restrictions were eased. Maybe it’s all coincidence but it’s tough going to try to hold on to €3.80/kg now.
Having to pick bulls out of pens can be hairy when a full pen is going, let alone picking out ones and twos
On farm, it means my plan for possibly two selling days had to change.
It also means trying to work out the extra feed needed to keep them longer and of more concern is a safety issue. Having to pick bulls out of pens can be hairy when a full pen is going, let alone picking out ones and twos. They were penned together in order of when they were likely to go to make loading easy.
I’d be less cynical about the Brexit fund, if it was announced after the local and European elections. While it’s welcome, it may prove to be very divisive among beef farmers, who appear divided already.
There’s a chance we haven’t seen the worst of Brexit yet, mind you there’s a chance we won’t see Brexit at all too. More will be revealed on that once it returns from it’s sabbatical.
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