Awesome stuff you see on the internet

Crucial

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="jegga" data-cid="563498" data-time="1457545641">
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<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/77721507/sheep-milking-flock-expands-by-another-3000-ewes'>http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/77721507/sheep-milking-flock-expands-by-another-3000-ewes</a>
 
Sounds like a great way to open another export market, I have to ask though in a country that has 50 or so million of the bloody things and a 140 year history of farming them why has it taken so long to figure out you can sell the milk?
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Because 49.9 million of them were meat breeds and there was a ready and profitable market for meat.
There is demand for sheep milk but it actually isn't that profitable.
Even a good producing ewe only produces 4-5 litres a day so you need lots more of them, a much larger milking set up, they don't milk for as long as cows so you have to keep them popping out lambs which means you need double the number to have enough on the milk etc etc.
Costs are very high. I visited a large sheep milking set up in Southland last year and it takes a team of six up to 6 hours a milking (twice a day) just to keep break even, and that was a very large shed as well. You also need almost year round grass to keep them going as otherwise feed cost in a dry summer or cold winter wipe out any money made.
Also if this takes off even more wait until the ferals catch on and start showing pictures of cute little lambs torn off their mums almost straight away so the lucrative colostrum can be harvested. Ram lambs are completely worthless in these set ups and are treated as such. 
It was a pretty harsh eye opener (and I am fairly open minded with the needs around farming) and difficult to see a good balance despite good intentions of the farmers.
My overall impression was that if I was ever to want to milk sheep it would be done on a small seasonal scale only with value added products for niche markets to try and make a living.

Hooroo

That doesn't seem right, Crucial? 12 hours a day milking? Also, as this progresses, effeciencies will be quickly implemented.I also don't understand why they need a bigger milking platform that a 50 bale rotary would be for cows?

Crucial

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Hooroo" data-cid="563530" data-time="1457557016">
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That doesn't seem right, Crucial? 12 hours a day milking? Also, as this progresses, effeciencies will be quickly implemented.I also don't understand why they need a bigger milking platform that a 50 bale rotary would be for cows?
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I think it was something like 2500-3000 ewes. You can't use rotarys for sheep. There were three bays of about 50 per bay so that is 60 times you have to clear the bay, get the next lot in, clean and cup. Fast workers were moving down the line the whole time and the setup was well arranged and automated.
6 hours is an extreme and only happens if there are holdups/equipment failure etc, it probably takes 3.5-4 hours normally.

Crucial

jegga

Crucial was the milking shed as automated as your average dairy cow shed? 
The article mentioned a part Chinese owned farm that was milking 3000 sheep I think, surely they must have a better set up than the one you mentioned. 
I'm actually genuinely surprised that this wasn't looked into earlier, on the radio they mentioned lower lactose in sheeps milk is preferable to Asians .

Hooroo

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Crucial" data-cid="563533" data-time="1457557806">
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<img src="http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160309/f1ccab2271984996addfd12b39c3a90b.jpg" alt="f1ccab2271984996addfd12b39c3a90b.jpg">
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That is a little shed. :)
 
Compare that to a forty bale heirring bone for cows.
 
I hear you, regarding times though.
 
I don't know why you couldn't put them in a rotary?

NTA

Maybe no-one wants to take on the cost of building a rotary at this point? Different size equipment I assume
 
That setup is bespoke, I assume.

Crucial

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Hooroo" data-cid="563537" data-time="1457558252">
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That is a little shed. :)
 
Compare that to a forty bale heirring bone for cows.
 
I hear you, regarding times though.
 
I don't know why you couldn't put them in a rotary?
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There are 3 bays like this. The shed is pretty big.
 
I asked about rotary and they said it had been tried and didn't work that well. Remember that the milking time is less for an individual animal so the platform would have to rotate faster or be much smaller.
 
This is actually an asian owned purpose built set up that had a lot of $ sunk into it. You should see the size of the feeding shed for winter. It was taking something like 6 hours a day just to do the feeding.
 
They are looking at various efficiencies all the time, but finding the balance of numbers/staffing/infrastructure/output etc is still quite difficult. It certainly isn't the cash printing machine some believe it to be.
 
The farm sizes need to be pretty huge as well given the number of animals involved. (those in milk + those in lamb + those drying off + ewe lambs)
 
I'm not saying it isn't profitable just that effort and investment v profit makes it no better than many other options depending on market demand.
 
From what I could gather, the milk broke even, any profit was in colostrum.

Crucial

This Google sat view shows a typical setup
 
<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='https://www.google.co.nz/maps/@-46.2678031,168.7719958,502m/data=!3m1!1e3'>https://www.google.co.nz/maps/@-46.2678031,168.7719958,502m/data=!3m1!1e3</a>

Hooroo

Interesting. I imagined it would be more profitable due to the higher solids per litre than cows.
 
A freind of mine left Fonterra recently to head the Goat Milk Powder plant here in the Waikato. That seems to be kicking along ok at the moment

jegga

It never ceases to amaze how you can raise pretty much any topic and the fernopedia has an answer, today we had Crucial with sheep milk and Siam with being paid to shag a ginger munter. Now that I think about it I don't think anyone actually asked Siam about that.

Tim

<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='https://www.facebook.com/Jamie-Gilts-Son-524458667726804/'>https://www.facebook.com/Jamie-Gilts-Son-524458667726804/</a>

jegga

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Tim" data-cid="563637" data-time="1457574958">
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<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='https://www.facebook.com/Jamie-Gilts-Son-524458667726804/'>https://www.facebook.com/Jamie-Gilts-Son-524458667726804/</a>
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Shes hot with piss poor judgement, any more pics?

gollum

jegga

<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://www.stuff.co.nz/motoring/news/77755353/ford-patents-incar-cinema-drawings'>http://www.stuff.co.nz/motoring/news/77755353/ford-patents-incar-cinema-drawings</a>

antipodean

<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://www.sadanduseless.com/2016/03/awkward-metal-bands/'>http://www.sadanduseless.com/2016/03/awkward-metal-bands/</a>

Catogrande

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="antipodean" data-cid="563875" data-time="1457661541">
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<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://www.sadanduseless.com/2016/03/awkward-metal-bands/'>http://www.sadanduseless.com/2016/03/awkward-metal-bands/</a>
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Aaaaand. The thread is back to being awesome.

Rembrandt

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="antipodean" data-cid="563875" data-time="1457661541">
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<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://www.sadanduseless.com/2016/03/awkward-metal-bands/'>http://www.sadanduseless.com/2016/03/awkward-metal-bands/</a>
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This reminds me of a funny video I saw a couple months back, can anyone tell me how to embed youtube vids?

taniwharugby

Just paste them in...sometimes you need to put the media tags on them, sometimes not' I have found you can paste the link or the shortened link and either work sometimes but not all the time.

booboo

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="antipodean" data-cid="563875" data-time="1457661541"><a class="bbc_url" href="http://www.sadanduseless.com/2016/03/awkward-metal-bands/">http://www.sadanduseless.com/2016/03/awkward-metal-bands/</a></blockquote>
 
6th row down: Kim Dotcom

The Silver Fern

Awesome stuff you see on the internet