Stunning results from Teagasc’s calf-to-beef trials in Johnstown Castle show that margins of more than €2,000/ha are achievable from a largely traditional calf-rearing system.
The results of trial of 80 Hereford and Angus crossbred calves bred from Friesian cows are to be showcased at the National Beef Conference in Kilkenny next week.
It looked at the returns achievable from February- and April-born crossbred heifers and steers. The heifers were slaughtered at 19 and 21 months, while the steers were killed at 21, 23 and 26 months.
This gave a spread of sales from September to June, which fits well with market demand.
The systems were primarily grass-based. For this reason, they proved to be less vulnerable to meal prices than the Holstein Friesian calf-to-bull beef concept that was trialled at Johnstown Castle in recent years.
Following the positive results from the large sexed-semen trial earlier this year, farmers are hopeful that the combination of this new technology with grass-based systems that produce animals tailored for premium beef markets will provide a viable drystock system that will compete with dairy systems for profitability.
Return
“Both the Angus and Herefords returned over €2,000/ha in the 19-month-old heifer and 26 month steer systems. That kind of return is just as good as your average dairy system,” claimed the Hereford society’s Michael Cleary.
While returns were boosted by the strong beef prices available over the last year, the Angus society’s Charles Smyth claimed that the system would still return more than €1,000/ha if beef prices fell to €3.50/kg.
“We’re very excited about the results. It was probably one of the worst years to be feeding animals and the system still blew everything else out of the water,” said Mr Smyth.
“It’s at least double the returns from the Derrypatrick herd.”
Michael Cleary said that he was particularly encouraged by the fact that none of the calves included in the trial were hand-picked or fed large amounts of meal.
“These were all genuine, run-of-the-mill calves. And with the bad weather, they were still only fed 2.5kg per head in the last 60 days,” he said.
Charles Smyth also believes that there is potential for even higher returns in the second year of the three-year trial.
“The first of the second crop of heifers were killed in the last few weeks, and these are killing out about 24kg heavier,” said Mr Smyth.
Both the Hereford and Angus societies claim that they are crying out for more supplies.
“We had hoped to bring more than 80,000 animals in under the scheme this year,” said Mr Smyth.
“However, it’s likely that we’ll only get 65,000, despite the fact that we’ve markets for at least 100,000 animals.”
The trials are being run in conjunction with ABP, who pay producers up to 40c/kg in bonuses for Angus and Hereford cattle that meet certain specifications.
Further results from the Johnstown Castle trials will be featured at the Teagasc National Beef Conference at the Newpark Hotel in Kilkenny on Wednesday, October 9. Registration begins at 9.30am.
(Source – Irish Independent – Darragh Mc Cullough – 01/10/2013)
John ‘Bull’ Hayes with the Hereford cross that he bought for €5,500 at a cancer charity auction in February. ‘Tubridy Fire’ continues to raise money, however, pulling in another €5,000 in a guess-the-weight competition at the Ploughing Championships last week. James Ormond from Enniscorthy, Co Wexford won €300 by correctly guessing 350kg. He donated his winnings back to charity