Field margins: Straw yields near double in Moray

Summer is a distant memory and now with the clocks rolling back, dark nights are looming and the winter regime of feeding stock is gathering pace.

Last week, we enjoyed a successful trip to the Stirling Bull Sales, selling our three Thurso Paul sons to average 9500gns which I think was the top herd average in the Charolais, although I will no doubt be corrected if this is wrong!

Elgin Charolais cows enjoying the great autumn weather - three months too late

The week was made even better when we were crowned large herd winners in the Scottish and Northern Charolais Club herd competition. We are delighted to have won this in such prestigious company and thanks go to all members of the club and the judge Iain Millar for putting on such a great show. Our stock bull Thurso Paul also achieved runner-up in the sire section. He is currently awaiting semen collection, so hopefully, all going well, we may have some to sell in the near future.

The bull sales have changed so much over the past 20 years. Gone are the Perth days of the bulls arriving on the Saturday and the Charolais not being sold until the Thursday. It was five days of amazing fun and craic but also tied in with hard work and, of course, trying to present and sell your stock to the highest standard.

And the long days in the mart bar, followed by the trip into Perth to the legendary Waverly Hotel, where the drams and karaoke went on well into the small hours.

This social side is now missing from the sales. It is now very business-like. I suppose it is just the changing times we are now in and people don’t have the time to spend a week away from home, as staff on farms are now at a bare minimum.

However, I do feel there was a lot crammed into the latest round of bull sales and that trying to fit all the breeds’ shows and sales into two days was hard on both the stock and stock people involved.

On the farm, harvest was completed six weeks ago, with the last of the malting barley being lifted a couple of days ago. This year, with plentiful supplies of malting barley, prices are not great but we’re fortunate in that our crop came in dry and yield was good.

Straw is in plentiful supply in Morayshire, with yields being near double from the harvest of 2023. Hopefully, this will result in prices easing for us stock boys and reducing our winter keep costs.

Our flat oats were cut on what was probably the warmest and windiest days of September – the good Lord was looking down on us that day! It was amazing to see them go through the combine with such ease and a very respectable yield resulted in us being able to sell a couple of loads which were surplus to our requirements. We use homegrown cereal rations to feed the growing cattle, based on barley, oats, draff, straw, silage and a balancer nut from Harbro. Silage has been analysed so we can now formulate a ration which is cost-effective and will meet the calves’ growing potential.

All calves received their first pneumonia vaccine three weeks ago and their booster will be given over the next few days. We have vaccinated for about 10 years and found it very successful, resulting in us having to treat very few ill calves and those we do have to treat for pneumonia usually respond quickly to the antibiotics. Tomorrow will see us scan our spring-calving pedigree cows – hopefully most will be in calf but I have seen a couple bulling over the past few weeks so 100% conception is out the window!

Last week, our farm had a carbon audit and for this, I went through my herd stats on ScotEID. Most of the cows met the 410-day calving interval, with seven missing the cut, so I took their numbers and studied them later that night.

All seven were pedigree Charolais and all very good cows that had been given another chance at the bull. These cows are inefficient in the eyes of the audit but this comes with breeding pedigree cattle – and one of the sacrifices that I will have to take to hold onto these cows and their genetics.

It is very interesting and I would encourage everyone who has not logged on to go and have a look at your herd stats on ScotEID.

Our next show is never far away and preparations are beginning for the Stars of the Future Calf Show at Stirling on November 9. We have a yearling heifer entered – the first calf to be shown sired by our juniorstock bull Fallenich Stormzy. She has just been inside for a week but seems very hospitable – just like her father and his breeder!