For this week’s Buildings Focus, Agriland made the trip down to Kilkenny to chat with a new entrant to dairy, Karl Dillon about his new dairy unit.
The Kilkenny native, originally in the suckler and sheep game, started milking last year and, as of now, is milking a herd of 128 predominately British Friesian cows.
Farming alongside his father, Michael, wife Elaine and son, James, Karl felt that in the long run, the sucklers and sheep wouldn’t be in a position to financially look after everyone involved in the farm.
As well as that, the creation of the M9 motorway – which cut through the Dillons farm wiping out 25ac – made it more difficult to continue with suckler and sheep, so the decision was made to go down the dairy route.
The Dillons new dairy unit comprises a 16-unit parlour, handling facilities and 70 cubicles all under one roof.
Speaking to Agriland’s Buildings Focus journalist Michael Geary about the move to dairy, Karl said: “The main factor behind our move was to be able to support two families financially.
“We had built up a good herd of sucklers and were happy to keep going with the sheep as well, but with two families pulling from the farm, the dairy became very appealing.
“Despite the motorway cutting through our farm, we still have an ample grazing platform to work off and with my son showing an interest, we felt it was the best route for us to go.
“We started off milking 70 cows last year and are now up to 128 currently. It’s only now we are starting to settle in really. Last year was mental busy and it’s really only now it has started to quieten back a bit.”
‘Getting into dairy is not for the faint hearted’
The first thing both Karl and his father Michael said to Agriland, was that if they were to give any advice to people thinking about going down the dairy route, it was to be prepared for the steep financial costs involved, and also to give yourself plenty of time to transition over.
Speaking first, Karl’s father Michael said: “We didn’t give ourselves enough breathing space in terms of the time we needed to transition over from the sucklers and sheep to the dairy.
“We made the move over in about 12 months, but really we could have done with 18 months at the very least.
“It just puts you under all kinds of pressure to get up and going because there is an awful lot to do, from initial planning to getting onto the building work and so on.
“So I’d just say to anyone that’s thinking about doing what we did, give yourself plenty of time to change over.”
While Karl touched on the financial end of changing over to dairy and said how he needed a “good stiff drink” when he was landed with the bills for the new project.
He added: “Getting into dairy isn’t for the faint-hearted. I remember sitting down in the kitchen with my wife Elaine looking at the money we had to pay for everything we did and I’ll tell you, I was in need of a good stiff drink when I saw the bills.
“Look we knew it was going to cost a lot of money, I suppose I just want to emphasise the costs that are involved and just to be prepared for what is coming if you do decide to build from scratch – like we did.”
What does the new dairy unit entail?
So having decided to build from scratch on a greenfield site right beside the M9 motorway, Karl and Michael spoke to Tom Ryan of Teagasc who helped them draw up plans for their new dairy unit.
From there, Michael and Karl got George Power of George Power Farm Buildings to come in and do all the concrete work – which included the tanks, the concrete work around the parlour and the cubicles.
The shed was sourced and erected by O’Dwyer Steel – with the Dillons very complimentary of the work carried out by both saying the quality and short space of time getting it done being excellent.
The hub of the new build is obviously the parlour – which is accompanied by an exit race, crush and drafting system on the other side.
While on the other side of the wall of the handling facilities lies 70 cubicles.
The gates and barriers for the handling area were sourced and fitted by Farm Relief Services. A Dairymaster drafting system was fitted as well.
Like many other farmers Agriland have spoken to in our Buildings Focus series, Karl and Michael said the drafting system is a great tool to have, that it takes the hardship out of separating cows and saves time, as you don’t have to get out of the pit during milking to chase a cow into a pen away from the rest of the herd.
At the back of the shed, a collecting yard – with 8ft tanks – was laid and can fit up to 140-150 cows. One mistake the Dillons said they made was not bringing the tanks up closer to the entrance of the parlour.
They said it gives them one extra job after milking to clean down the yard that they could have avoided, but they were under pressure to get the job done in order to be ready to get cows in to milk.
The main part of the shed is made up of 70 cubicles. The cubicles and mats were sourced from EasyFix.
Two automatic scrapers were fitted to scrape down either passageway to the tank at the front of the shed.
Cows can be fed from two sides of the shed, with two sliding doors fitted at the back of the unit.
The plan next, is to convert an existing slatted shed into a 30-40 cubicle house, as well as possibly building another cubicle shed down the line – so as to be able to accommodate all cows and possibly further expansion in time.
At the front of the build, just inside the door of the dairy, a 10,000L bulk tank can be found.
The 16-unit parlour
The biggest decision for the Dillons was deciding on what make of a parlour to go with to milk their cows.
Tom Ryan of Teagasc, organised for the Dillons to go and see other farms and to talk to farmers to get a feel for what might the best option for them.
However, with many of their neighbours dairy farmers, they saw that Dairymaster machines were residing on many of them and from that point on, decided on going with them.
Karl added: “We went around to other farms to get a feel of what might suit us best. We thought about all forms of how we could milk our cows, but decided on going with a herringbone parlour.
“Then we decided to go with a Dairymaster parlour. A good few of our neighbours have them and were happy with them so we just said we’d go with them.”
The Dillons installed a 16-unit Dairymaster Swiftflo Swing parlour with room for 20 units.
Continuing, Karl said: “We have a nice spec of a parlour that has sequential bailing, automatic cluster removers (ACRs), auto-wash system, dumpline, commander pad for each unit – which gives information on each individual cow’s milking, feeding and animal health – and a batch feeding system.
“In time, we will look to put in a feed-to-yield system, but it came to a stage where we had to draw a line as to how many extras we were going to put in.
“We also left room for further expansion in the future, as we can add a further four units onto the parlour to bring it up to 20 units.
“At the minute, it takes about two hours between bringing the cows in, milking them and washing up after in the morning and about 5-10 minutes less in the evening.
“We are very happy with the machine. It’s a good solid parlour and it does what it says on the tin.”
‘Happy with the move’
Karl said that he and his family are happy that they made the move to dairy and that, even if they didn’t do it now, he saw it happening at some stage in the future.
Concluding this week’s Buildings Focus, Karl added: “To be honest, despite the pressure of and stress of making the switch to dairy, it’s one we are happy we did.
“Like I said, being able to provide an income for two families was our aim and, even though I’ll be paying it back for years to come, we feel dairy is less volatile of an industry to be in, more so than beef, with the way prices were going for a long time.”
“We enjoyed the sucklers and sheep and built up a very good herd of cows and flock of ewes, but we had to think about the financial side of it and think about how we would make sustainable living – and dairy seemed the way to go.”
The new dairy unit is costing the Dillons about €3,500 per cow as it stands.
They were eligible for a grant under the Targeted Agricultural Modernisation Scheme (TAMS II) but had used up a fair chunk of it on a slatted shed they erected not so long ago.
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