We are still shut down with TB. It is rumbling slightly, with one reactor in each of the past two tests. Obviously it is sods law that the best heifer had to go.
This will mean at least another test in February and again in April while we are calving.
We will rear the beef calves and see what happens before we decide whether to send them to a dedicated TB/orange market.
It is incredibly frustrating, but at least we can juggle the space we have to do this and hopefully we will not lose financially on a weaned calf.
Drought
The drought this year meant we got through our silage rather quickly, but have managed to purchase more and reclamped that in the pit ready for spring. This is combined with the hope of a good turnout date.
Cows are now on our meadow hay and settling into their dry period, with calving planned to start on February 10.
We normally manage to keep about 40 cows milking through, but this year it was just not to be. Output has been down after a flying start last season with the lack of grass to graze hitting yields.
Our second current Countryside Stewardship (CS) agreement has arrived, with further herbal leys to be introduced onto our original ground, along with more hedgelaying and fencing.
After attending the Oxford Farming Conference last month as part of the Inspire 2022 group, I was pleased to hear that the payment rates of both capital and management options have been increased and that CS is now staying.
My concern is that this will increase the complications with the Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI), as not all options can be run alongside, and rotational options on CS could cause havoc so think wisely.
It was also announced that SFI would have an increase of an additional 20/hectare (8/acre) for the first 50ha (124 acres) entered to help with application costs.
Application
Although it is a very simple application there has not been a huge uptake with only 224 payments made last year. I am not sure this payment of up to 1,000 will sway those still on the fence.
It was great to finally be back at an in-person conference after last attending the Positive Farmers Conference in 2019.
I find it so motivating to be speaking with a wide variety of people from across the country with different viewpoints and sharing their successes.
It always makes me return to the farm with renewed focus and goals for the year.
Although the conference covered many topics, innovation and the environment were common themes. We have to push forwards, farming in an environmentally sensitive manner, while improving efficiencies.
Our milk purchaser, Barbers, has just undertaken carbon footprinting across all of its suppliers and compiled a traffic light type report. I was surprised that some producers were still calving heifers at 30 months of age and feed use per litre was not being monitored in some cases.
These simple-to-address changes have a huge impact on both profitability and carbon efficiency.
Although the UK has some of the most carbon-efficient milk production in the world, we can move the industry forward and promote our produce as such.
With carbon in mind, we are also looking further into biochar and producing some for some small-scale in farm trials.
We are hopeful that the addition would increase soil functionality and also aid cow health. If anyone has any experiences, good or bad, please get in touch.
Claire Eastham
Claire Eastham farms with her husband Martyn in Dorset, where they milk 120-spring calving cows. After gaining knowledge and experience working for other businesses, the couple started their own dairy farming journey in 2015 by taking on a share farming agreement before progressing to their current county council farm.
