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70,000 dairy cows?

My suggestion and you can call me crazy but if you could put 3 or 4 of those dairy cows on your place I would. Most are dog gentle and you wouldnt have to worry with milk prices getting close to $6- $8 a gallon.


As for cull cow prices I am sure they wont be coming back up for awhile. More Dairies are going under every month.
 
Ok MsSage, you are crazy!! :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

You won't find any milk cows on this place!! Can you imagine buying
those cows and having to milk them every day, twice a day, by hand??????????????????? EEEEEEEEEEEKKKKKKKKKK.

We milked a cow or two for the first 15 or 20 years of our marriage.
When the last one died of a fast-acting pnemonia (her name was Honey-Do :P ) that was it. No more milk cows. They did serve a useful purpose
at one time as I sold milk and eggs to get by financially. I had a regular milk and egg route in town. Wouldn't want to do that again. So many things are okay when you are young, full of energy, ambitious and broke... :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

I do feel bad for the milk cows and the dairy folks. All that work and nothing to show for it. Golly.
 
we used to be in the dairy business, dad kept a few cows that wouldn't work for milk cows, bad foot, 3 tit, etc. he buys calves that they split off pairs at the sale tries to buy the ones that are a little small for the ropers and puts them on the dairy cows at the house. 2-4 calves per cow depending on how much milk each cow has. sometimes more calves but you get the idea. i counted 67 calves out there the other day. now he doesn;t mess with them everyday himself (his employee does) but they put the cows in every morn and afternoon. they get big enough to wean and he gets more calves bought to the fields they go. pretty good deal and you can prob buy the dairy cows cheap
 
It's unbelievable how much the price that dairy farmers are getting paid for their milk today, it's not even worth for the little guy to stay in business.

I don't have any sympathy for the mega dairy farmer, but it's the little guy, who busts his a$$ to milk 30-50 head a day who I just feel awful for. The dairy industry is in my blood so to speak. Perhaps the Holstein bull who nearly took out my uncle 2 1/2 years ago was sending them a message because it wasn't soon after that my aunt and uncle decided to retire from the Dairy Industry.
 
I wonder really how much your cull price is bad in the US because of the dairy sell off?? In Canada there is no dairy sell off - cull beef cows are 28-34 cents generally at the moment close to 10c down on the year. Problem here is we have no competition in the cow market. Every cow I sell is making a large donation to the Nilsson Bros benevolent fund. It's daylight robbery.
 
Anyone who markets cull cows this time of year is already used to not getting much for them. Once we preg we'll put the opens on a silage diet for awhile or just breed them for fall calvers..
 
Denny said:
Anyone who markets cull cows this time of year is already used to not getting much for them. Once we preg we'll put the opens on a silage diet for awhile or just breed them for fall calvers..
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I used to believe that too Denny but the economics don't stack up here at the moment. I can feed my cows as cheap as anyone around here on fall grass but even at 80c/day gaining 2lbs a day we are still losing money on the deal. The feed cost of putting them on silage alone up here would be $1.70 a day before yardage. With cull prices as low as they are you just can't feed them cheap enough. Sure they will be dearer maybe in February, definitely in April but the cost of wintering fattening and holding them until market price rises is a poor risk compared to feeding just about anything else I could buy at the moment.
 
As a Dairy Farmer I will say there is some light now at the end of the tunnel, I think it has gotten about as bad as it can and based off of the supply and demad being forcasted, we will rebound some this year, but I think with as many Dairy farmers who have sold out in our area, next year (2011) look for increases in the prices! The Beef industry will follow soon after! :D
 
Grunex said:
As a Dairy Farmer I will say there is some light now at the end of the tunnel, I think it has gotten about as bad as it can and based off of the supply and demad being forcasted, we will rebound some this year, but I think with as many Dairy farmers who have sold out in our area, next year (2011) look for increases in the prices! The Beef industry will follow soon after! :D
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Not unless we get quota in beef and you all get your quota back in dairy.
 
Grunex said:
As a Dairy Farmer I will say there is some light now at the end of the tunnel, I think it has gotten about as bad as it can and based off of the supply and demad being forcasted, we will rebound some this year, but I think with as many Dairy farmers who have sold out in our area, next year (2011) look for increases in the prices! The Beef industry will follow soon after! :D
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Typical dairyman. The price is as low as the government funding will allow, so the price will miracuosly rise!!!

Better keep every heifer calf and get her into production so that the next time this happens, you can tell yourself and everyone else that this to shall pass and us beef producers that your cull sellouts don't affect our prices.

What a bunch of BS!!!
 
My grandfather was about in his sixties durring the last buyout and used it to retire from milking. He still raised some heifers and did hay. He died several years later and that's when we bought our first Herefords.
 
The dairy bus. is the most screwed up thing in Agriculture. I don't know if it 's the dairy cooperatives or the producers who can't see beyond the next milking. I've seen dairymen paying $1,500 for bred heifers when milk prices were in the tank. And their cooperatives shipping milk from the West coast to the east and from the East coast to the west. The way milk is hauled around is an absolute joke. I think the dairy cooperatives are as bad as any Unions. :?
 
As a dairy farmer I will say this a dairy farmer is his worst enemy. When the milk price is up we expand and when it is down we turn to the government to support our bad habits. I milk 200 cows dont have any plan on expanding and never will but there is several dairies in this area that are expanding their operation because the government give them more money. I also blame DFA for a lot of the problems that have occured over the past year they dont want small dairies they want huge ones that they can go to and pick up multiple truck loads.
I also agree this you guys that there should be some sort of regulations on how many cows a operation can have. How you reg. the problem? I dont know. But I do know this that if you do away with sexed semen you will help with the problem. But I do feel for the beef guys not just because I am one as well but because of all the money the dairy recieves from the government and the beef boys are left picking up the bill to make the beef industry looking good.
 

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