Every minute counts at this time of year. With calving in full throttle, it is easy to slip into an autopilot mode where repetition replaces reaction and lateral thinking. If you can save 10 minutes every time you calve a cow, that’s 17 hours saved over the course of calving 100 cows.

Think about that for every job you do in the day. Is there a simpler and a quicker way of doing things?

1 Get animals out to grass: the long-range forecast is for a continuation of the high pressure that has been over Ireland for the past two weeks. It really is phenomenal weather and to make the most of it animals – particularly milking cows – need to be out grazing. The reduction in work is massive when cows are outside – cleaner teats, no cubicles to scrape and lime and higher milk solids production when cows are on grass.

2 Feed calves cold milk: there is no evidence to say that calves need to be fed warm milk when air temperatures are mild. Heating milk takes time and energy. By feeding milk cold, calves can be fed stored milk at any time of the day.

3 Feed calves once a day: once-a-day milk feeding reduces the time spent feeding calves by 50%. This is a huge labour reduction and like feeding milk cold, it also means that calves can be fed at any time of the day, provided they are fed at the same time every day. When calves are fed once a day they eat more meal. However, young calves won’t eat stale meal, so remove any rejected meal from the troughs daily and feed to older stock before topping up with fresh meal. Most farmers will feed milk twice a day for the first three or four weeks before going to once a day, but some farmers are going to once-a-day milk feeding sooner.

4 Simplify milk transport: as the number of calves on farms increases, the amount of milk that needs to be moved from the milking parlour to the calf shed increases also. Pumping milk or using trolleys is a lot easier, faster and safer than carrying buckets. Small electric pumps are cheap to buy and can be used to pump milk from the parlour to the calf shed. Some farmers can fill tanks outside the dairy by attaching a hose to the pipe that goes into the bulk tank, thereby freeing up the dairy from barrels and clutter. If all cows being withdrawn from the bulk tank are milked together, their milk will go straight to the storage tank for feeding calves.

5 Have a colostrum policy: heating up colostrum in a plastic feeder bottle is slow. The plastic on these bottles is thick and it could take 15 or 20 minutes to heat the colostrum up properly. A better policy is to store colostrum in recycled milk cartons. Ideally, these should be stored in a fridge and removed when required. The plastic on a milk carton is much lighter and when immersed in warm water will heat within five or 10 minutes.

6 Feed cows at night: feeding cows silage at 5pm in the evening means fewer cows calve for the following 12 hours. Some cows will still calve at night, but it’s a lower proportion than would calve if cows had access to feed around the clock. The advantage is nighttime checks can be reduced or eliminated. However, there is evidence to say that more cows will calve early in the morning, so mornings tend to be busier for calvings.