Livestock Event News
Cumbrian Dairy Herd Wins NMR Silver Salver
10 September 2012
David and Louise Hodgson and their team from Burgh by Sands in Cumbria, are runners up in the NMR/RABDF Gold Cup and were presented with the NMR Silver Salver at Livestock 2012, NEC, Birmingham today (Tuesday September 4).
David and his father Harry currently manage the 145-cow Wormanby Holsteins with relief help.
Their new cubicle house for 105 cows allows year-round housing of the majority of the milking herd. They sell milk on a liquid contract to Arla but each year they have up to 40 newly calved heifers for sale along with breeding bulls and these livestock sales amount to a third of the business’ gross income.
“We are reaping the benefits of the new housing all the time. We have seen an increase in yield of up to 500kg a cow and we have only had six cases of mastitis within the past 12 months since we started using the building,” says David.
The housing could easily be extended, should herd numbers be increased.
For the qualifying Gold Cup year ending September 2011 the herd averaged 10,761kg of milk at 3.76% fat and 3.12% protein on twice a day milking.
“We believe that if you are breeding the right type of cows and you feed them correctly, the milk will follow. The aim is for cows to achieve 50,000kg within five lactations. Currently there are 40 EX cows in the herd with 70 VG and 30 GP cows.
While milk price is likely to have some influence on profitability, margin over purchased feed over the 12 months to March 2012 has increased by 15% to £2,120 a cow. The current cell count is 128,000/ml with a Bactoscan of 23.
Left to right RABDF President David Leaver, RABDF Chairman David Cotton NMR Silver Salver winners 2012 Louise and David Hodgson and NMR Chairman Philip Kirkham
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