Key decisions this week have focused on setting the cows and the farm up for next season. Cows confirmed with Johnes (initial milk screening followed by a confirmation blood test) and Staph have all been culled and the last discretionary culls confirmed for each herd. The first group of 20 cows were dried off this week.
The rotation length has been pushed out by reducing the area grazed per day however with paddocks being dropped out of the round for wintering and springers the proportion of effective area grazed has not changed much. This has required an increase in the amount of supplementary feed for all herds. There are now only 2 paddocks left to have their final grazing before setting up for winter.
Soil conditions across the farm are close to field capacity so the team are juggling the grazing of this seasons new grass paddocks around rain events to minimise the chances of damaging them.
The Std FB herd continues to be the only one with all cows on OAD milking (based on herd BCS, feed supply and lameness incidence a couple of weeks ago) but with declining growth rates and ongoing lameness challenges across all the herds it is likely the other herds wont be far away from OAD milking either.
