Skip to main content

Hire a farm manager she said, we will have more free time, she said

Don't get me wrong, bringing Jennifer on board as the farm manager has been a game-changer for the farm.  The difference between our bumbling ways and her direct approach to problems means that costs are under control, while revenues have exploded. 

We are in month 2 of 2024, and revenues are up 50% compared to January of last year.  We got a lot of help from the government (new import restriction on foodstuff).  January 2024 was the first month where the combination of higher high tunnel temperature (burning methane), expanded use of CO2, and computer-controlled artificial lighting resulted in a production explosion for January. The benefits of the UK government's stupidity have only begun to bear fruits with higher demand and prices (talk about a self-inflicted wound).

This means that Jennifer has forced us to make hard decisions more quickly, but also based on better analysis.  The addition of 10 new high tunnels: Jennifer.  The immediate building of two new warehouses on the new farm, and the new milk parlour: Jennifer.  Staff retention program by retraining: Jennifer.  The separation of meat and vegetable processing: Jennifer.  It is Jennifer who with the help of our biologist and the biodigester manufacturers increased our methane yield by adjusting the composition of the input.  Getting the right manure composition was the key.  Listening to good ideas by some of our employees (e.g. bringing forest pigs to the farm).  Acquiring a beekeeping business to simplify our pollination process, all recent changes to the farm spearheaded by Jennifer.  She is the common thread.

My wife and I made the decision to increase our acreage, but that was based on a study we had commissioned several years ago which demonstrated that successful commercial farmers required between 1,000 and 4,000 acres of land.  We are still only at 1,200 acres.  

New plans for 2025, modifying high tunnel planting sequence, preparing additional acreage dedicated to grain and corn sillage, build new silos that will automate the feeding of our expanded milking operations.  The big one, reduce diesel consumption by half, and ideally entirely replace diesel consumption with methane-powered farm vehicles by the end of the decade (the technology is not there yet).  This is not driven by ecological principles (although they count) but as a way of reducing exogenous costs.

The impact on my wife and I, we spend a lot of time planning, reading and making big but well-informed decisions.  

Note:  I should point out that LPG tractors have been available for decades, but never displaced diesel-powered ones because diesel was cheap, and LPG-powered tractors were expensive and complicated to maintain.  Rising diesel prices have been a huge incentive, especially with the smaller tractors operated in the UK.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ok so I lied...a little (revised)

When we began looking at farming in 2013/14 as something we both wanted to do as a "second career" we invested time and money to understand what sector of farming was profitable.  A few things emerged, First, high-quality, source-proven, organic farm products consistently have much higher profit margins.  Secondly, transformation accounted for nearly 80% of total profits, and production and distribution accounted for 20% of profits: Farmers and retailers have low profit margins and the middle bits make all the money. A profitable farm operation needs to be involved in the transformation of its produce.  The low-hanging fruits: cheese and butter.  Milk, generates a profit margin of 5% to 8%, depending on milk quality.  Transformed into cheese and butter, and the profit margin rises to 40% (Taking into account all costs).  Second:  20% of a steer carcass is ground beef quality.  The price is low, because (a) a high percentage of the carcass, and (b) ground beef requires process
Post a Comment
Read more

21st century milk parlour

When we first looked at building our farm in 2018, we made a few money-saving decisions, the most important is that we purchased our milk herd from a retiring farmer and we also purchased his milking parlour equipment.  It was the right decision at the time.  The equipment dates from around 2004/05 and was perfectly serviceable, our installers replaced some tubing but otherwise, the milking parlour was in good shape.  It is a mature technology. Now, we are building a brand new milk parlour because our milking cows are moving from the old farm to the new farm.  So we are looking at brand new equipment this time because, after 20 years of daily service, the old cattle parlour's systems need to be replaced.  Fear not it will not be destroyed instead good chunks will end up on Facebook's marketplace and be sold to other farmers for spare parts or expansion of their current systems. All our cattle are chipped, nothing unusual there, we have sensors throughout the farm, and our milki
Post a Comment
Read more

So we sold surplus electricity one time last summer...(Update)

I guess that we will be buying an additional tank for our methane after all.   Over the past few months, we've had several electricity utilities/distributors which operate in our region come to the farm to "inspect our power plant facilities, to ensure they conform to their requirements".  This is entirely my fault.  Last summer we were accumulating too much methane for our tankage capacity, and so instead of selling the excess gas, that would have cost us some money, we (and I mean me) decided to produce excess electricity and sell it to the grid.  Because of all the rules and regulations, we had to specify our overall capacity and timing for the sale of electricity (our capacity is almost 200 Kw) which is a lot but more importantly, it's available 24/7, because it's gas powered.  It should be noted that the two generators are large because we burn methane and smaller generators are difficult to adapt to burn unconventional gas, plus they are advanced and can &qu
Post a Comment
Read more