My thanks to Stephen Lowe for giving me such a great opportunity to explain what Free Range dairy is all about on his BBC Radio Lancashire show on Sunday. We are very lucky to have a number of committed members in the county and today’s exposure for the initiative was down to Free Range Dairy…
In many ways we are grateful for the all the rain we have in this country. Without it, we certainly wouldn’t be able to grow the lush green grass to feed our cows. But, I think we got more than our fair share in 2012 and we are finding ‘wet spots’ in a number of…
I have been invited to discuss the objectives of Free Range Dairy with Steven Lowe on BBC Radio Lancashire this Sunday (28th April) at around 12.45pm. We have had good support for the initiative from Lancashire and I am planning a further meeting for members in the north-west later next month. I am really encouraged…
Next Wednesday (1st May) we are hosting a grass reseeding day jointly organised by the British Grassland Society, DairyCo and EBLEX, at Walk Farm. Two weeks ago I was having nightmares about having no grass to show anyone and the field we plan to use as a car park being too wet to carry anything.…
An article on the Farmers Weekly website highlights how milk producers supplying Marks & Spencer are supplementing cow diets with extruded Linseed to reduce saturated fat levels in milk. The article states: “Milk saturated fat levels naturally drop when cows go out to grass and increase at housing. This natural fluctuation is due to oil…
I read a headline on the Farmers Weekly website this morning saying “Dairies must pay more to secure supplies” – a headline that has been repeated in the farming press for years, a headline that is true and one that I fully support. But, why, despite all the protests, the public support, the fears…
Last Friday’s issue of the Farmers Guardian carried an article about plans for Free Range Dairy in the coming year. Political Editor, Alistair Driver, interviewed me at the recent event held by the APPG on Agroecology in Westminster. There is growing interest in the goals of Free Range Dairy amidst moves to encourage dairy farmers…
Last Tuesday (16th April) I was invited to present my ideas for Free Range Dairy to MP’s at an event organised by the All Party Political Group (APPG) on Agroecology, in The Houses of Parliament. Also present were 10 other farmers and organisations promoting sustainable farming. For some farmers ecology does mean aggro – busy…
There have been a number of useful articles published in the farming press over the past couple of months aimed at helping dairy farmers make better use of grass this spring (whenever that may be). However, I notice more and more seem to be erring on the side of caution when it comes to how…
A while back I posted a story about Dutch dairy farmers being rewarded for grazing their dairy cows by the milk processor Friesland Campina. The premium farmers receive is EUR 0.50 per 100 kg milk. To receive the premium, a dairy farmer must allow his or her cows to graze outdoors for at least 120…
The wet weather we had last summer, combined with the prolonged winter we have yet to escape, means that grass growth has been slow and the ‘green stuff’ isn’t as green as we would like it to be. We woke up to a white frost on Tuesday morning and didn’t feel much like spring. However,…
I found an interesting article on the website Dairy Herd Network www.dairyherd.com which provides a lot of news on the US dairy industry. Nigel Cook, the incoming President of The American Association of Bovine Practitioners, manages the Dairyland Initiative Programme at the University of Wisconsin School of Veterinary Medicine. The Dairyland Initiative was launched in…
Here is an extract from a book I have just bought from Amazon. “Since the 1870’s British farmers have had neither stability nor security. Politicians’ promises have been made and forgotten, war-time prosperity has been followed by slump or uncertainty”. “The fundamental reason is not hard to find, the public, quite naturally, prefer to buy…
I’m digging holes and I’m measuring grass growth (or rather the lack of it) and, in the process, I’m measuring how cold it is by the numb feeling in my fingers as I walk the fields. I had a good stomp round most of our grass ground nearly two weeks ago with my trusty plate…
In my quest to produce more milk form grass I am going to really try and understand more about the grass we grow and the soils that feed it. So, today, I ventured out with my spade for a bit of an exploratory dig. Now, I’m no soil scientist, but I do know that looking…
Word is some folks have turned their cows out to grass already and, hopefully, it won’t be long before a lot more follow on farms around the country. Can you remember how it feels – the warmth of the sun, the smell of the earth, the sound of grass been tugged by hungry mouths? All…
At this week’s BGS / BSAS conference in Malvern, Mike Wilkinson from Nottingham University presented a paper titled “Trends and targets for milk from forage”, in which he highlighted how little milk actually comes from forage on many farms. Data collected from farms costed by Promar farm business consultancy showed that the average milk yield…
The horsemeat found in beef products throughout UK supermarkets may not have posed any significant risk to the health of those eating it, but it has caused widespread mistrust. The shocking findings by the Food Standards Agency (FSA) have exposed how the demand for cheap food has resulted in consumers being deceived on a massive…
It doesn’t look like the ground is going to dry up round here for a month or so yet, which means that the prospects of an early turnout for our cows have pretty much vanished. Meanwhile silage stocks are getting tighter and I am keeping a close eye on what we use and being very…