Parlour patter with the... THOMAS FAMILY
Cheryl Thomas of Gelligatrog,
Kidwelly, Carmarthenshire, runs 160 cows under the Gatrog prefi x, alongside husband Elwyn and daughter Anwen
It’s all change for us
at the moment as Anwen started secondary school in September,
attending the local Welsh school. She catches the bus at the end of our farm lane, so gone are the days of changing out of my overalls in the morning, although I can’t say I have ever been one of those mums who put a full round of make-up on before doing the school run. My usual routine was a wet wipe to get the muck off my face and some hairspray to camoufl age the smell! The fi ne weather in September meant we could keep the “lows” out longer and they had access to TMR during milking times. The “highs” were still going out for their morning stroll after milking and would come back in around 2pm and were housed until the following morning.
For many years a group of us South Wales Holstein Wags have been going on a spa day. Our intention at the start was to meet up every few months, but as every one is so busy it’s more like once a year. We did manage to meet in September and a nice day was had. We usually moan and groan about a hundred topics and feel a lot better until we get home to the stress of everyday farming….we love it really! Llandyfaelog Show was upon us yet again with the noted champion of champions competition. Our homebred third calver Gatrog Sarge Lavender took this award in the cow section where she also won this title two years ago in the heifer section. Cramar Sid Fran, who is jointly owned with Roger and Dianne Steeples, took the heifer champion of champions this year with Caer Fever Flora 133 taking reserve place, the latter being a recent purchase at the South Wales Holstein Club Show and Sale.
The following week was our own Club Calf Show. Anwen qualifi ed in the handling section and was rather excited about going off to the All Britain’s. I think I was about 16 before I started leading calves, so she obviously follows her father.
September was a good month for bull sales with numerous enquiries and several sales. Our Friesian enterprise has really kicked off, I often wonder if we should be buying sexed semen, but for bull calves. (I can hear many of you saying “sexed semen results in bull calves anyway”). Feeding fresh calves can be very time
consuming and frustrating. I recently had three heifer calves born within 24 hours. Two of them were sucking colostrum from a bottle and teat, but the third one just held its tongue out to the side of her mouth with no interest at all. She just wouldn’t suck so I ended up stomach tubing colostrum for three days. As soon as she went over to milk powder she sucked. I think some calves just don’t like the taste of colostrum. Yet again I must note another price cut by our milk buyer. This winter will be challenging to say the least and I certainly hope we will avoid a further cut down to 25ppl. Elwyn did attend the open meeting held at Carmarthen Mart organised by Farmers for Action. We are lucky that this group is representing us as and industry. It is sad to see that some farmers think as the milk price falls we need to milk more cows. Doesn’t this just make the problem bigger?
As our recent TB herd test was clear we were able to exhibit at the Welsh Dairy Show. Thanks again to Phil Arrell for his able assistance and a special thanks to Frances Evans of the Deri herd and Harriet Davies of the Praire herd for their help. They are a great duo who just get on with it and muck in. It also helps they’re pretty girls, therefore,attracting fellow breeders to come and look at the cows! We had our fair share of rosettes at the show with one red and fi ve blues, as well as the reserve championship and Anwen took the reserve champion Jersey heifer as well. We also won the Best Cattle Presentation award (see picture above) so all in all, a good day’s work.
I end this issue just as I have returned back from the All Britain’s Calf Show. It was a great display of handlers and calves with great enthusiasm for the breed. Anwen enjoyed her experience and thanks to Ffl ur and the rest of South Wales HYB for looking after her.
Cheryl
Herd Size: 160; Average milk yield: 10,200 litres 3.88%bf and 3.22%p; Farm size: 192 acres; New technology: Elwyn and Cheryl; What looks good in the calf pens: Gatrog Mincio Culture, Gatrog Sammy Steffi and Gatrog Sammy Fame; What is in the fl ask: Iota, Impression, Mincio, Pirate, Brady, Golddust and the British Friesian Blackisle Benloyal; Flagship families: Oralie, Beauty, Torch, Desire, Irene, Jingles, Lavender; Favourite cow: Weeton Golden A Oralie; Bulls in AI: Gatrog Breezer and Gatrog Steffi c; Classifi cation: 47 EX, 55 VG, 23 VG heifers and 11 GP, averaging 88 points; Other enterprises: British Friesians and Anwen has two pedigree milking Jerseys
136 THE JOURNAL DECEMBER 2014
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