Tipperary Waterford

Club Committee 2020

Club Notes – Winter 2020

Field Evenings
The club held 2 great stock judging evenings in June. The first one at Cappoquin Estate Farm home of the Tintur Herd, where Roger had great cows ready for judging. Our Judge for the night was Billie Dean who did a great job. Thanks Billie. After the judging, Roger gave us a great presentation on the management of the Tintur, an excellent herd a great herd of high production cows along with a demonstration on the robots. It was all very interesting. Thanks Roger and the hospitality was excellent. A great evening enjoyed by all.

2nd Field evening was on the farm of Ailbe and Denise Ryan and family. Again great cows for judging. A great herd of cows. Our judge for the night was Tommy Screene who did an excellent job. Tommy also judged our Herds Competition and gave us a great run down on all the herds in the competition. Hospitality was excellent with a real party atmosphere. Thanks to the Ryan family. Prizes for the herds competition were presented on the night. Congratulations to all the winners in the Stock Judging and the Herds Competition.

Club Trip
We had a great club trip to England in August. We travelled from Cork to Birmingham. Our first visit was to Mike Gould’s Woodmarsh Herd, where we were given a wonderful welcome. Mike gave us a great run down on his management of this great herd of high production cows. 500 cows, all indoors, being milked 3 times a day. Afterwards we went for lunch in a lovely pub where Mike and his wife and her sister joined us, along with the judge for the UK Dairy Show from Switzerland, Patrick Ructtimann. Thanks very much for having us we really enjoyed the visit.

After that we booked into our hotel, The Lion Hotel in Shrewsbury. It was a lovely, in a very old historic town.

Next day we had a full day at the UK Dairy Day. A great show enjoyed by all.

The following day, we went to Cogent where we saw some of the bulls and were given lots of information on the breeding program which was very interesting.

Cogent organised herd visits for us. First was a herd of 2400 cows, a beautiful place where the cows very well managed. The manager spent lots of time showing us around and answering all our questions.

The second herd was new into farming having built up his herd to 220 cows.

The last day we went to Kirkby Herd of Pure Friesian. A great herd of pure Friesian cows. Again a very different system of farming – robotic milking mainly housed with access to 50 acres grazing. It was very interesting. Thanks to the Griffin Family for hosting us.

Back to the airport and home after a lovely trip. Thanks to Gordon, our chairman, and his helpers for organising it.

Kathleen Kelly