Having started with a small dairy herd a little over a decade ago, husband-and-wife John and Sylvia Powell are now milking 220 cows on their busy farm outside Birr in Co. Offaly.
The herd, a mixture of Holstein Friesian, Jersey and Kiwi Cross, produces approximately one million litres of milk per year which is supplied to Lakeland Dairies via Arrabawn Co-Op in Nenagh. This is a far cry from the 20,000 gallons which the Powell’s produced in their first year as dairy farmers.
“It was all dry-stock with us until 2004 when we decided to get into dairying. We started out with 40 cows and have gradually increased our numbers since then,” Sylvia explains.
“I come from a dairy background and John had worked on dairy farms in Australia and New Zealand, so we knew what we were getting ourselves into. I spent a year in New Zealand also. It’s very time-consuming compared to other types of farming – the cows have to be milked twice a day after all – but it has been great to see what was once a small enterprise grow to the size it is today.
“Following the removal of milk quotas last March, it’s an exciting time to be involving in dairying. There are new opportunities to be had and our aim is to increase our herd size further over the next few years.”
John and Sylvia, along with their three young boys Sam (eight), Adam (six) and Isaac (three), farm 210 acres on the Clareen Road out of Birr and a further 125 acres in nearby Lorrha, Co. Tipperary. John, a native of Templederry, Co. Tipperary and Sylvia, from Newtowncunningham, Co. Donegal, met while they were on farm placements on the farm of John’s uncle, also John Powell, in Nenagh.
They got married in 2001 and purchased the farm in Birr from another uncle of John’s, Reggie Abbott, the following year. The farm was then 100 acres, but the Powell’s have obviously expanded operations quite a bit since then.
John holds a Green Cert and was a finalist in the FBD Young Farmer of the Year competition in 2000. Sylvia, meanwhile, has a three year Farm Management Cert. They are assisted on the farm by Michael O’Brien, who recently returned from Australia where he managed 700 cows, and Donegal lad Matthew Sweeney, who is a first year student in Advanced Dairy Herd Management.
Over the past two years, John and Sylvia have invested in a new 237-cubicle cowshed and a state-of-the-art Boumatic Gascoigne Melotte milking parlour, which was supplied by main agent for Ireland Richard Kingston from Athy, Co. Kildare and installed by Oliver Peake of Peake Dairy Services in Mountmellick, Co. Laois.
Established in Ireland since 1935, when the company traded as Gascoigne, Boumatic Gascoigne Melotte supplies the highest quality farm equipment, from herringbone, rotary and robot milking machines to herd management tools and dairy hygiene accessories. It is a worldwide leader in dairy innovation.
The Powell’s have a 30-unit swing-over milking parlour with cluster flush. Cluster flush is a flushing system that washes out the cluster after every cow, keeping the cluster fully sanitised before going onto the next cow. This effectively eliminates the threat of cross contamination of mastitis between cows. The system is fitted in line and is operated by using electronic which are wired into the existing machine, meaning it can be fitted onto any type, size or brand of milking machine. It is fitted with a dosatron pump which mixes the parasitic acid and water that kills any bacteria in the cluster.
“We are very pleased with the new milking parlour, which has reduced milking time to about one hour and 15 minutes. We installed it in 2013 and followed that by building a new cowshed last year. We have invested heavily, but hopefully it will pay off in the long run,” Sylvia says.
The Powell’s dry off their cows every November in advance of the calving season, which usually begins in February. They rear about 100 heifer and 50 bull calves each year. This year, they plan to keep the majority of their young heifers which will eventually lead to an increased dairy herd size of about 250.
Sylvia is excited about what the future holds for the Irish dairy sector, despite concerns about falling milk prices and the impact the decision to lift EU milk quotas will have.
“We’re very confident going forward. There is a bit of a down at the moment, but we had it good for two years. We fully expect milk prices to recover and that the abolition of milk quotas will have a positive effect for everyone. There will soon be a worldwide market open to us, and we have to be ready for that.”
Always keen to embrace modern technology, the Powell’s use a Kingswood computing package for grassland measurement. Kingswood’s Farm IT System is the control centre from which you can manage your herd, fields, grass and financial recording.
John and Sylvia Powell
Boherboy House,
Fortal,
Birr,
Co. Offaly.
Telephone: 087 7767735
Taken from Irish Tractor & Agri magazine Vol 3 No 8, September 2015
