They say a change is as good as a rest, but in certain farming circles change is viewed with scepticism. I’ve seen this in some of the Knowledge Transfer groups I’m part of and also from going to dairy walks and talks.

When you mention the conversion to dairy some would give you great encouragement and then others, well, there will always be the others. Some would say “stick to what you know”, “there are enough lads milking cows”, “you’re going to be stuck in a milking parlour 24/7”, “what about all those sheep you have?”.

It’s safe to say, I’ve heard it all at this stage. Although not all of the feedback was bad, it does make you double check your figures and go over your plans again and again to make sure you have it all worked out, but at the end of the day if you want it and it makes financial sense, you have to go for it.

We didn’t mate ewe lambs this year as the heifer breeding will start on 1 May

That being said, after a good few evenings going through figures, chatting to farmers that have converted, going to dairy events and of course meeting the banks, we have pushed on and purchased a group of weanling heifers that we plan on milking in spring 2019. This gives us all of next year to get the conversion work done and get as many of the heifers in-calf as we can.

We had some nice beef cattle fit for the factory over the last few weeks which left us with a few bob that we converted this into crossbred heifers.

I’m very happy with them, but my father who’s used to looking at 500kg plus beef animals thought they were “a bit small”.

Although small in stature, they are well on target weight for their breeds and have the figures to back it up.

As a sheep man, I hadn’t much of a clue about EBIs or kg of milk solids or any of these alien terms when I started looking for stock but you learn fast when you start hearing the prices for good stock. When the milk price rises the value of stock follows suit. I’ve also learned when you add the word dairy to anything the price also goes up.

We have most of the heifers on a rape crop supplemented with hay and meal with the strongest heifers in on slats, we were both amazed at the difference in how happy, healthy and content the ones on the rape were.

We have never out-wintered cattle before so it’s a learning curve but the thrive is noticeably greater in the out-wintered ones. It is a bit more work but so far so good, but could have a different view if it rains from now until next February.

With the stock bought and winter here in earnest, the dairy project is parked until the spring comes. The rams have had three weeks with the ewes and after a colour change on the raddles to monitor progress, we are on target for a nice compact lambing from 17 March. This will probably be our last large-scale lambing so I’m determined to make it a success.

The end of an era

All ewes received a mineral bolus in compliance with the Sheep Welfare Scheme and they were in ideal body condition score at mating. We didn’t mate ewe lambs this year as the heifer breeding will start on 1 May and I didn’t want to be ran ragged from lambing straight into breeding.

Mating ewe lambs previously helped us to build numbers and gave an extra boost to lamb sales, when managed correctly I think it’s a really great job to mate them as lambs.

Lamb draft has slowed down a small bit, we were drafting every two weeks from the lambs on redstart but this crop has ran out of road and we sent the last of the lambs from it. I must say, it was a huge success and I will be growing it again next year.

Thirteen acres of the crop finished 400 lambs consistently hitting 46% kill out, the first few we killed from meal and grass only hit 44% kill out but they were only on meal for a short period of time.

The carrying capacity of the crop was another huge pro, this allowed us to free up other fields for ewes and beef cattle.

The Christmas plans

While we will be without the field until we get it back to grass in the spring, I still think it could be incorporated into reseeding plans for farmers.

We introduced concentrates to all of the lambs we have left as there is no power left in the grass at this time of year. We will house some of them shortly as the weather is hampering thrive a bit and we are also closing ground for lambing in the spring.

Hopefully there won’t be too many left come Christmas week as this is generally when the ewes get housed.

The circle of life doesn’t be long coming around.

We have about 70% of the ground closed and plan to spread lime when the soil sample results return from the lab. We sent soil and silage samples last week, it really is a small expense for the invaluable information you get back.

You can’t aim to improve if you don’t know what your target is.

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Here is more work from Dara Killeen