Swiss diary: Questioning your habits

When on an agricultural exchange, one begins to question every practice at home. You have to question yourself, purely to justify why your method works when you are presented with something completely different. It can quite often be the case that tradition dictates agricultural practices.

For example, Swiss cows graze each paddock before the younger animals. Once they have moved on to the next one, the year-old heifers are let out to graze. Once they are finished, the calves are given the chance to eat what is left.

This is the complete opposite to the leader-follower system drilled into us through the education system at home. The logic here is that the cows are producing milk and therefore must get the best grass available.

Every week, the salt holders in front of the cows had to be topped up. This was a new concept for me, though I’m told it is practiced in Ireland also. The Knüsel family explains that it is to ensure the cows do not suffer from a deficiency in iodine.

A calving jack is unheard of

Two to three weeks before calving, the cow is moved to a stall at the end of the barn where she is fed hay only. Again this is very different to the system at home, yet a calving jack is unheard of here.

Hay is made throughout the summer. It is picked up by the Pottinger wagon and is reversed up into the loft above the cows. A grab comes down from the roof to put the dry hay into the left side and the slightly damper hay into the right side. Air is blown through the hay on the right and the temperature has to be checked daily to make sure it does not go on fire.

In my three weeks here, silage bales have been made twice and soon the maize will be turned into bales also. They put the mower onto the Carrero and then the Hurliman drives the Lely baler. The Knüsels also have their own wrapper, which they bought with a neighbouring farmer.

Farmers' children pay less for land

Selling farmland here is also very different. The land is given a yield value based on different factors such as topography, climate, size, distance to farmyard, etc. When passing on farmland to children, they must give their parents the yield value of the farm. Investment credit can be obtained from Swiss banks to help pay for this if you are under 25 and have an agricultural education.

However, if the farm is sold to someone outside the family, they must pay three times that value. This system prevents land prices from rising exponentially, as they have done in Ireland.