Visitors to an open day organised by Lely on the farm of Gareth McAdam near Portadown last week heard that in order to produce more milk from grass, a zero-grazing system has been adopted.

Gareth started milking cows three years ago, initially with a secondhand parlour, and moving to a Lely A4 Astronaut robot 18 months ago. In total, 100 acres are farmed, which includes 60 acres of owned land, but with a limited land block of only 24 acres around the yard. Access to the remaining land block requires crossing and using a busy road.

He is currently milking 58 cows, yielding 8,442 litres at 3.97% butterfat and 3.32% protein. He has increased milk from forage from 1,845 litres to 3,528 litres in 12 months.

Speaking at the event, Harold Stevenson from McLarnon Feeds said: “Milk from forage on this farm is continuing to increase by 50 to 100 litres each month. More farms here need to be achieving this to be able to compete on a global market.

“The NI average milk from forage figure of approximately 1,500 litres per cow is a long way from where we want to be.”

According to Ronald Annett from McLarnon Feeds, grass grazed efficiently is the cheapest source of forage, but if utilisation is poor or the farming system does not work well with walking cows in and out of paddocks, then zero-grazing is a competitive option.

Quoting costs per tonne of dry matter based on a 200-cow herd, Ronald said that zero-grazing cost £148.87 and inefficient grazing below 65% utilisation had a cost of £149.70, whereas efficient grazing cost £129.02.

Input costs

In his calculations, input costs are £25/ha higher with zero-grazing due to increased slurry spreading costs. Harvesting costs, attributed only to zero-grazing, were £544/ha. Ronald said that all other input costs, as well as management, is the same for all the systems.

He said that the advantages of zero-grazing included having an easily managed, uniform sward with no urine patches and an extended grazing season.

Cows spend more time lying down in zero-grazing systems and 20% to 30% more grass can potentially be utilised per acre compared with grazing.

Gareth cuts a load of fresh grass in the morning and another in the evening, with each run taking approximately 30 minutes. He originally used a converted double-chop harvester, but he has recently purchased a Grass Tech GT80.

Ronald said that double-chopping grass is not ideal as it can go off quickly but, in smaller herds, the use of converted machinery, second-hand zero grazers or contractors may be needed to make it economical.

Last winter, Gareth fed 2kg of concentrates per head in a TMR as silage quality was poor, but this winter he aims to get more from forage by feeding better quality silage (ME 11.1MJ/kg DM) in blocks and only feeding concentrates through the robot. Cows are fed to yield at a rate of 0.30kg/litre and on average 2.5t of concentrates are fed per cow.

Breeding

“We decided to import Fleckvieh cows from Austria because typically they are good on their feet and carry more condition, so culls are worth more and can be hardier. We bought Holsteins because of high-yielding characteristics and because they were available to buy in locally at a lower cost. We are now adding more hybrid vigour to the herd by crossbreeding between the two breeds,” Gareth said.

AI bulls are being selected for fast milking traits to maximise the number of cows the robot can milk. Gareth estimates he could potentially milk another 10 cows through the machine.