A Good Return From Small Herd

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31659, 20 April 1968, Page 9

A Good Return From Small Herd

In the experience of Mr D. W. O’Callaghan, who farms 660 acres at the foot of the Lowry Range, near Culverden, the most satisfactory aspect of running cattle is that a good profit can be obtained for only a small amount of work.

Mr O’Callaghan was one of the principal speakers at a field day in his district sponsored by the Aberdeen Angus Cattle Breeders’ Association. Outlining his farming policy, Mr O’Callaghan said 260 acres of his property were subject to Springs, and was very wgt in winter. His 50 cows and calves were confined mainly to the swampy parts of the farm, and they had proved useful in knocking the heavy growth down prior to development into pasture. In dealing with the swamp, his practice is to plough it up in the autumn, and after letting it lie over the winter, disc it when the springs have dried and put it into a winter feed crop. After being fed off in good time, it is cultivated for grain crops, then put back to grass. Mr O’Callaghan said that, from his point of view, the satisfactory aspect of cattle was the small amount of work they involved for a good return. Mr O’Callaghan's practice is to buy in cows and heifers, mate them with an Aberdeen Angus bull, and sell off the calves. He said he had gradually been calving earlier each year. He wanted to see how

autumn calving would work out. Prompting him to try autumn calling was the fact that calves born in the spring could not cope with the spring flush of milk, and this frequently caused cows to dry off in one or more quarters. When the feed dried off in November, the spring calf required more milk, but it was not available. With autumn calving, Mr O’Callaghan expects that the cows will not milk so heavily in the early stages; then when the spring flush does come, the calf will be big enough to cope with the extra milk. To a question, Mr O’Callaghan said that although his herd was only a small one, proportionately, it was the most profitable item on the farm. One of the problems in getting round to autumn calving was that there were always some cows which did not calve till late, even with spring calving. Mr O'Callaghan said he had shown no preference for any particular breed. He purchased cows at Addington market with the idea of breeding a crossbred calf. There was no

appreciable difference at. the time the calves were sold between the calves from Hereford, Aberdeen Angus or crossbred cows. He did not know what ages some of the cows were that he purchased. Some of them could have been 20, but they had calves which were just as good as those from young cows. Asked why he did not keep replacement heifers, Mr O’Callaghan said his system meant he could buy cows when he required them and have them calving when planned. Asked if he expected to obtain a better return with autumn calves, he said if the autumn-bom calves did not give him a better return he would go back to July calving, and sell in April, because unless there was some margin in favour of autumn-calving, it would not be worth continuing with it. Questioned on the merits of fattening steers rather than running a breeding herd, Mr O’Callaghan said he used to buy in steers from Addington market. But this system involved trucking charges both ways, and there was always the risk of striking a market which was not so good. With steers, one must fatten them, he said. He did not think they could be used as economically as cows for breaking down swamp. Since the field day, Mr O’Callaghan sold 38 calves at Addington market for a gross $2154.50. Sixteen steer calves sold at $65, another nine at $54.50, and thirteen heifer calves at $4B. Spread over the whole herd, this was a gross return of just over $43 a cow.