Autumn block calving on the rise
Our latest figures show the number of farmers switching to autumn block calving has risen, with potentially more to follow.
Eleven per cent of farmers now identify themselves as autumn block calvers, compared with nine per cent in 2016. And almost two-thirds of those who said they were likely to change their calving pattern would also choose autumn calving.
We gathered the data as part of our optimal dairy systems programme, which is helping farmers lower costs and drive efficiencies by encouraging them to focus on either all year round or block calving.
The numbers reflect what I’m seeing on farm and regardless of system I encourage farmers to review their current approach, compare themselves against others and choose the system that’s optimum for their farm, mindset and milk contract.
The shift to autumn calving comes from all year round calvers since their overall percentage dropped two per cent to 74 per cent. The proportion of spring block calvers stayed the same at seven per cent.
Of the seven per cent of farmers who said they were going to change their calving pattern, 59 per cent said they would choose autumn calving, 16 per cent a dual spring and autumn block, and five per cent either spring or all year round.
Strategic dairy farms are being recruited reflecting each production system as we know farmers learn best from other farmers. We have already launched strategic dairy farms in Cheshire, Devon, Oxfordshire and Leicestershire with more coming soon, but we’re still keen to hear from top performing farmers across Wales who may want to join our strategic farm network.
Each farm hosts regular open meetings and shares key performance data to enable other farmers to compare their performance and identify areas for improvement. I’d encourage everyone to take time out to visit one of our strategic farms, it will be time well spent.
Later in the year we’re also launching Farmbench to help farmers understand and compare their full costs of production against farmers running the same system and show areas for improvement.
More information about optimal dairy systems, key performance indicators and strategic farms can be found at dairy.ahdb.org.uk.
Izak van Heerden, Senior Knowledge Exchange Manager, AHDB Dairy
