Dexter Cattle For Sale Discussion Board

I was delighted to see Saffy’s prompt on feeding magnesium if there is a shortage in your farm soil. When I was chasing cows for samples for the bulldog experiment, the enormous number of cows reported to have been lost through magnesium deficiency depressed me. It was brought home to me that it is...

There can be a variety of reasons for not being halter trained. The owner may be ill or even deceased. In my case I have a herd of thirty plus cows and very limited labour, it is just not practical and not necessary for my routine management. I certainly do not consider my animals are worth less, I...

I agree with Margaret, but the difficulty is knowing whether you need to test. My last posting crossed with yours Liz hence I didn’t read your second till I had posted. Our testing is expensive; I think the first priority is all bulls, which is planned. While it is true that early cases could be mi...

The idea of tripod hay was to enhance the quality. It was before the days of hay bales. When it comes to baling tightly the aim of hay dealers is to save on transport. As a buyer my response is split - loose light bales are usually good quality, but buying by the bale and not weight makes them expe...

‘Where it came from, really makes no difference’ On the contrary it is an important factor if you are not going to waste a lot of money on unnecessary testing. I agree with Clive you need to test all bulls, but if you are aware of the original source, the only females that need to be tested are tho...

I am surprised this subject hasn’t cropped up before; the Americans are keen to show that it originated over here; although I think it more likely it is home grown. It is essential we track any occurrences over here. The danger to the dam means it is more than likely to have been publicised if it h...

Putting a silage clamp in is expensive, but it provides me with a method of coping with contractors in our unpredictable summers, on a small farm. I confess I go for bulk rather than quality. My cows don’t calve until spring so winter-feed does not need to be high protein, but I do need to ensure I...

It is very sad to see the last Royal, however two points were made in Saturday’s farming programme on the event. It is intended to have a cattle show in 2011, and also there is a smallholders exhibition planned for the future. We should obviously have a place in the latter, and it is to be hoped we...

My thanks to all for those good wishes; I had a super day thanks to all my Dexter friends. My apologies for all the weeds in the pics., it has been too wet to mow, and I wont use weed killers. I always have some buttercups but I suspect the recent weather suits them. My cows that have calved to dat...