Staying positive despite the setbacks (From Western Telegraph)

Staying positive despite the setbacks

It has been one of those years that few Pembrokeshire's dairy producers will look back on with joy.

Stephen Alderman, the new county chairman of the NFU, admits he is no exception - 2002 will be remembered only for the setbacks which have beset the business he runs in partnership with his two brothers.

A new milking parlour completed six months behind schedule, inadequate rainfall resulting in poor grass growth and now a bovine TB breakdown. The year can only get better!

But Stephen remains positive. "It hasn't been a good year, but if we can survive this one we can survive any.''

The Alderman family has been dairy farming on the Castlemartin peninsula for 40 years.

Until 1997, they also had a flock of 600 ewes and grew 150 acres of cereals. The 650-acre business now concentrates solely on milk production, averaging an annual output of 2.3 million litres.

The dairy herd was enlarged to 420 two years ago, when stock values were low. But the daily throughput in a 10/20 herringbone parlour with an additional 70 cows was a time-consuming 12 hours. The cows endured an 80 minute walk to the parlour and stood for long periods to be milked. The impact on herd health was far from satisfactory.

The farm desperately needed a new milking parlour. "We were due a rent review with our landlords,'' recalled Stephen. "We put in a notice to negotiate a rent reduction, but were told it was not viable. We then put forward a request for help in financing infrastructure improvements on the farm.''

The estate contributed 40% of the cost of installing a 24/48 swing-over Waikato parlour, improved infrastructure and additional milk quota.

The herd has been split into two - spring and autumn calvers - and the old parlour has been retained to milk the smaller herd. The result has seen milking times more than halve.

New cow tracks have been laid, together with 4,500 metres of water pipes, supplying 20 500-gallon drinking troughs.

A bulk tank capable of holding 20,000 litres of milk was installed specifically for every-other-day collections, but this has never been needed. From the outset, the milk has been collected daily.

Stephen had planned on getting the parlour completed six months earlier. It did not come on line until the end of April and a major concern was that stress associated with the change-over would diminish the herd's fertility rate.

But the scanning results have been a pleasant surprise. Twelve per cent of the herd is not in calf - a marginal improvement on last year. "On reflection, anyone who set out to do what we did would deserve to have 20% of the herd empty,'' Stephen conceded.

A combination of a cold spring and long dry spells later in the year resulted in a desperate shortage of grass.

The farm rises from six metres above sea level to 75 metres, with the lowland peat ground achieving grass yields of 100 kilogrammes in May and June. But this 130-acre area dried up and provided very little grazing. The Aldermans were forced to feed silage surplus from previous years. Twenty-two acres of stubble turnips provided additional fodder.

"We normally have a 35-40 day rotation, but because we lost the peat ground we had to supplement with silage,'' said Stephen.

"We used 100 tonnes of dry matter in the form of silage and 20 tonnes of concentrates, we used up all our resources. We would be vulnerable if we had another poor grass season next year.''

Milk yields have fallen as a consequence, but these have been masked by the excellent production from March to May.

The spring calvers have averaged 4,000 litres and the autumn calvers 6,800 litres. Analysis shows 4.2% butterfat levels in milk produced by the autumn calvers and 3.57% protein. The spring calving herd achieved 3.9% butterfat and 3.28% protein.

The business has been dealt another blow after a TB test revealed ten reactors.

The herd had cleared a routine test two years ago, but it had to be re-tested last month because a neighbouring farm had bought a cow from an infected herd.

The result means that the Aldermans will almost certainly be unable to ranch their dry cows on Castlemartin Range this autumn - a resource they share with another dairy farmer.

"We have got silage to feed, but we are going to be short at some point in time,'' Stephen said. "We have got the facilities to look after them, but our cash flow is going to be under pressure.

"Fortunately, we have got a surplus of spring animals which we were going to sell as in-calf heifers. We will need them in the herd now.'' TB will be one of the issues topping Stephen's agenda during his next 12 months in office.

It is a job he is well qualified for - his wife, Sara, is the NFU's Pembroke South group secretary.