growing the milk business Archives - Clover Hill Diaries

Two more sleeps and we open the farm gate warts and all for our Field Day.

A huge amount of work has gone into getting both farms ready (or as close as we can with all the major rainfall events) both on farm and at the regional Landcare facilitator’s office at the Southern Rivers Catchment Management Authority.

I have three presentations to get ready which is bad enough and now I hear the Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry is going to film the entire event.

Research shows 9 out of 10 farmers learn from other farmers. We know we push boundaries and we don’t always get it right so its important what you share.

So I have decided to focus one of my talks on what we could do better.

This started by listing 10 things we do well and then listing 10 things we want to do better and second list was frightening

Firstly I wrote down what I thought, then I asked Michael and then I got Nick’s opinion and OMG did I end up with a long depressing list. So I think the first thing we need to do better is not be so hard on ourselves

So here is the list of what we do well

Very focused on doing what it takes to stay in business and employing young people and contributing to local economy
Animal well being and environmental stewardship focused
Chase knowledge and implement technology
Outsource the expertise we don’t have
Push the boundaries
Grow pasture well
Engage with the community
AGvocate
Monitor inputs and outputs
Share/communicate our story with the farming community
Whole of industry vision and we partner and collaborate

Now I am off to whittle down that long list of things that we could do better

Meanwhile David and the dry cows get on with seeding season. See previous post here http://cloverhilldiaries.com/2012/03/08/seeding-season-begins-with-a-bang-and-a-whimper/

In 2000 our dairy farm was a one man operation milking 80 cows twice daily.

In 2005 our cow numbers had increased to 180 and we moved to milking three times daily

In 2008 we took on a second lease farm and milked a total of 400 cows three times daily

Today we employ ten people and milk 500 cows on two farms

The home farm never ceases to amaze me.

In the last 35 years the amount of land we farm on has stayed the same.

The number of people working and the cows being milked keeps increasing.

Clover Hill cows coming home for milking Boxing Day 2011

In 35 years the dairy has grown from a 6 bale walk thru to a 5 aside herringbone to a 14 aside double up herringbone.

Michael reflects on the milk biz changes in his lifetime

And the milk vat. More than anything I think the milk vat gives the most visual story of the growth of our milk business

This week we installed a 30,000 litre milk vat.

When we installed the 5,000 vat in 1995 we never dreamed we would fill this let alone get to the stage were we filled it twice a day. Its hard to believe 30 years ago our daily milk production fitted into a 1,000 litre vat.

Its no mean feat getting a 30,000 litre vat up our hill let alone finding enough room to put it at the dairy

The vat would replace two x five thousand litres vats we currently have

Inside

Outside

As you can see room isn’t exactly abundant

So the sacrificial lamb was my garden – but all in a good cause

So now we had found the spot. The next thing was to source a vat, only to find it had to be made in New Zealand and that took 16 weeks. Then it needed 2 cranes and a team of specialists all available on the same day at the same time to make it all happen.

Between the farm team we managed to capture this historic day via mobile phones and camera/video footage.

You can watch the video footage here

and see the photographs here

Not one but two cranes

The truck driver looked pretty pleased to get it there all in one piece. The trip from the dock wasn’t exactly a walk in the park with the vat shifting quite a bit to one side on the way as you can see