March 2016 Newsletter

Milk Price & Supply

The milk price for the month of February is the same as last month - 27.11 cents per litre (123.38 cents per gallon) at 3.60% butterfat and 3.30% protein. This includes a bonus of 0.88 cents per litre for a Winter Somatic Cell Count of less than 200,000, an SDAS bonus of 0.15 cents per litre and including VAT at 5.2%.

The average price paid for the month based on the average butterfat of 4.20% and protein of 3.28%, including SCC, SDAS bonuses and VAT is 29.10 cents per litre.

The milk supply for the month of February was 6,932,025 litres (1,158,349 gallons). This represents an increase of approx 31.63% on supply compared to February 2015.

Health Cert

Health certs for 2016 are included in this month’s accounts. The Department has made one change to the way these certs are completed.

The new cert no longer has 2 pages where herd owners fill in all tag numbers of milk producing animals. A printed list of the tag numbers of all your milk producing animals should be submitted. This pre-printed list must also be signed and dated.

A pre-printed list is available if you are registered with agfood.ie, ICBF, or otherwise you may use a pre-printed list from the Veterinary Practitioner nominated and approved to TB test the herd.

If the herdowner cannot access a pre-printed list, a legible handwritten list on a page signed, dated and supplied by the herdowner is still acceptable.

Workshop Videos

Visit drinagh.com to view presentations made at Carberys Dairy Workshop, in all four presentations were given, covering Johne’s Disease, TCM, CellCheck plus milking machine washing.

Carbery Trees

There has been an extremely good reaction to the Carbery tree project, with widespread uptake from suppliers and very complimentary comments from customers and media alike. At the time of writing there are a small number of farmers who have to collect their trees.

Suppliers are encouraged to collect these trees before they are handed over to local communities for planting

2016 Milk Bonus

At a recent meeting the Board agreed that any milk bonus to be paid by the Society based on 2016 supplies will be subject to suppliers having purchases greater than 7.0 cents per litre for the full bonus.

Purchases between 5.0 and 7.0 cents will receive half of any bonus.

Purchases of less than 5.0 cents per litre will not qualify for a bonus.

Monitor Farms

The programme is starting on its next five year phase. We are seeking to find suitable farmers to be part of the programme as monitor farms. Are you a farmer who wants to be part of a team with a focus on delivering increased farm profits through increased use of grass, higher stocking rates, better breeding, increased milk solids, increased sustainability and tighter cost control? Are you comfortable letting your fellow farmers know how your farming is progressing including the mistakes made along the way. This programme is about sharing the information and practical experience gained by implementing the best advice available on your farm.

Each monitor farmer will be expected to:

Measure your grass weekly and record it on the web based Pasture base database.

Milk record and participate in Herd Plus with ICBF.

Complete an annual cash budget and monitor this against actual each month

If you are interested in being considered as a monitor farm for this next phase of the join programme please apply with you contact details to Tim Regan.

Johne’s Disease Programme

2015:

Over the past month, efforts have been made to subsidise farmers that participated in the Johne’s Disease (JD) 2015 pilot programme. This has been based on information received from AHI where farmers have completed two milk tests or one blood test. There are however a cohort of farmers that signed up to the pilot programme and for one reason or another were assigned as ‘incomplete’ on the AHI database.

If you have completed all the necessary JD testing and you have yet to receive your JD subsidy, please make yourself known to your co-op advisor and they will ensure you get reimbursed accordingly.

2016:

Carbery have increased their subsidy to €150 towards the cost of individual cow testing and the Department will pay the cost of the risk assessment.

As part of Carbery’s on-going efforts to encourage farmers to participate in the 2016 pilot phase an application form is enclosed in this month statement. Any new supplier that wishes to participate should complete the form and return to their co-op advisor.

All participants that were involved in the 2015 pilot programme will receive a letter from AHI in the coming weeks. Every supplier that was involved in the scheme last year will automatically be accepted in to this year’s programme. Any supplier that does not wish to be involved in this year’s scheme will need to return the form to AHI stating that they do not wish to continue in the scheme.

Drinagh Coarse Calf

Drinagh Coarse Calf promotion is coming to an end.

Call to your local branch before the 31^st of March to avail of special offer price.