When Cathal Moran took over the farm from his father Edward in 1997, they were milking 16 cows with a milk quota of 60,000 litres. The 57 ha farm overlooking the flat plains of Kilkenny had multiple enterprises, from sheep and tillage to cattle and forestry.

Significant expansion has taken place since then. Next year, the farm will milk in the region of 360 cows.

Today, there are 259 cows going through the parlour and there are 144 ha being farmed. Funnily enough, the only land bought in the meantime was 50 acres of forestry – Cathal’s pension fund.

This farm has expanded through leasing land and it is this that the Irish Grassland Association will focus on when they visit Cathal as part of the summer tour, next Tuesday.

Lucky

Cathal has been fortunate in that, over the years, opportunities have come up around him to lease land. This has enabled him to expand his milking platform. Eight hectares were leased in 1997, 13ha in 2007, 16ha in 2010, 20ha in 2015 and 19ha in 2017. All of this land is a cumulative addition to the farm and so far all leases have been renewed.

But up to 2015, it wasn’t land that restricted milk, it was quota. In 2009, Ireland was way under quota and the feeling among many was that quota was no longer a limit. Cathal went from 72 cows in 2009, to 144 cows in 2010.

But quota was still an issue and he got stung with a superlevy bill.

To avoid another big fine, cow numbers dropped to 132 in 2012 and increased steadily to 194 by the time quota was definitely no longer a worry in 2015. In all, Cathal says he spent €250,000 on milk quota since he started farming.

Performance

Despite being in Kilkenny and having excellent quality land, the Moran farm is not without its challenges.

While drought may be an issue in a dry summer, it is actually the terrain that will cost Cathal more in the long term.

The farmyard is built on the side of a hill and the majority of the land is below the hill.

On a clear day you can see four counties from the handling unit.

The yard itself is about 500 feet above sea level. With 300 acres around the parlour in an elongated farm layout, walks are long.

Cathal measured the distance to every paddock on the farm and the average is 900m.

Take away the paddocks that are on the periphery and closed for silage during the main grazing season and the average drops to 660m from the parlour. That still means the average walk is 2.6km per day. Allied to the fact that cows are climbing to reach the parlour, this means that extra energy is consumed going up the hill.

With this in mind, the production per cow last year of 480kg of milk solids sold is quite good, even if a tonne of meal was fed per cow. Stocking rate on the milking platform last year was 2.96 cows/ha and Cathal reckons this was a factor in the extra meal being fed. Stocking rate on the milking platform this year is 2.57 cows/ha.

Black and white

The herd is primarily black and white having come from a British Friesian base. Cathal bucks the trend for large grass-based herds in that he hasn’t gone down the crossbreeding route to any great extent.

“I’m happy with the cows I have. To me fertility is the biggest driver of output and luckily we have good fertility in our herd so crossing to gain hybrid vigour of which fertility delivers approximately sixty percent of the profit advantage doesn’t appeal to me at the moment especially with the gains being made in black and white genetics over recent years, but I’ve nothing against Jerseys either just breed to the highest Economic Breeding Index (EBI) bulls whatever the colour,” Cathal says.

Average constituents in 2016 were 3.67% protein and 4.31% fat. Herd EBI is €103 and fertility performance is good. Seventeen late-calving cows were sold this spring, meaning the whole herd calved in just seven weeks. The rolling average empty rate is 5% to 6% after 12 weeks. Dairy artificial insemination (AI) is used for the first five weeks and then beef AI is used for the next four weeks followed by natural service by two stock bulls for the next three weeks.

Leases

The farm map in the office tells Cathal’s expansion story. For many farmers, getting an opportunity to lease one farm next door is a big opportunity, but Cathal has been able to lease a couple of farms.

The original block of owned land has now snowballed. How did it happen?

“It certainly wasn’t planned as such. I suppose we spent a good bit of time and money developing the original home farm with drainage, reseeding and soil fertility.

Our motto has been to do the same on land we lease.

We have spent a good bit of money on reclaiming and reseeding leased land but we don’t do it for charity. Leased land has to perform,” Cathal explains.

It is clear that Cathal has positioned himself to be an attractive tenant for landowners in the area wishing to lease out their land. Today, 62% of the Moran farm is leased, with some leased land linking other leased land.

Infrastructure

The last three years have seen significant investment in infrastructure. The original farmyard was across the road from where the parlour is today. The old yard is now used for rearing calves and wintering some cows.

Cathal started developing the yard across the road in 2000, building a 35-cow cubicle shed and a six-unit milking parlour. More cubicles and a lagoon were built in 2007. One hundred outdoor cubicles were built in 2013.

The biggest investment took place in 2015, building 246 cubicles, a 30-unit milking parlour and dairy, installing three-phase electricity and building a bigger lagoon. The yard is now set up for 360 cows. Kale and beet were used to bridge the gap between cow numbers and available cubicles before 2015.

On top of money spent in the yard, water, fences and new roadways were installed also.

Most of the stone used for roads was sourced from the hole dug when building the lagoon and the yard is set into the side of the hill so stone is not scarce.

Over the last three years, €720,000 was spent.

The milking parlour is a 30-unit DeLaval herringbone with space for eight more units. Cathal says he couldn’t afford or justify a rotary parlour.

Looking ahead, Cathal is planning a new silage slab.

At the moment, a couple of thousand round bales are being made. Other possible considerations include an underpass but he wants a few more years under his belt before making any further big investments.

“On this farm cows come first. My view is you can always sell some cows if you have to, but you can’t take back concrete.” Cathal says.

Lessons

With considerable commitments (leases, debt, labour bills and drawings), how does Cathal manage?

“We have a lot of commitments so we do need to protect ourselves in light of fluctuating milk price. For me, that’s achieved in two ways. A high proportion of the milk sold to Glanbia is in the fixed milk price schemes.

At its peak, we would have had two-thirds of the milk fixed, but that is back to about 55% now.

“The second thing we focus on is achieving higher constituents by focusing on fat and protein per cent. Currently this adds about 3c/l to our milk price. Between the two of these, milk price last year averaged 32c/l.”

On the fixed milk price scheme, he said that while he’s been a net gainer under the scheme, it was never about winning or losing but about minimising the impacts of a fluctuating milk price.

The Irish Grassland Association dairy summer tour takes place on Tuesday 25 July. Tickets are available at www.irishgrassland.com.

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