Cattle
Getting started with cattle - Jo Rowland takes a look at the rules and regulations involved with cattle-keeping
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| Cross-bred suckler heifers with yellow primary tag and metal secondary tag |
WHEN I was growing up in the fifties and sixties, starting any small farming enterprise was a simple matter of visiting your local auction market and bidding for whatever took your fancy. The only paper work involved was a receipt for the cash you handed over, often directly to the auctioneer! Many was the time I'd shared the back seat of my father's van with a couple of calves imprisoned in sack bags with just their heads protruding!
Time moves on and anyone selling or transporting animals in this way now would find themselves in very serious trouble as you have to have a certificate of competence to transport animals over 65K. Various organisations are offering training in this, at the time of writing the National Farmers' Union were running a special offer costing £30 for its members.
This is far from being the end of the red tape involved in livestock keeping so what else do you need to be aware of when setting up a cattle enterprise?
If you don't all ready have a County Parish Holding (CPH) number then you must register for one right away as this number is used extensively to track you and your farming enterprises whenever you contact official bodies such as Defra, divisional veterinary officer or the cattle tracing service plus others.
If you are taking over an existing smallholding, the chances are that it all ready has a CPH but you still need to check and ensure that the number matches your own details. Contact the Rural Payments Agency (RPA) customer service centre on 0845 6037777 between 8:30am and 5pm Monday - Friday and holidays, and between 9am and 5pm at weekends. www.rpa.gov.uk/rpa/index. nsf/home.
Once you have obtained a CPH you will also be sent a form to gather more information about yourself and your farming activities. On completion, you will be issued with a single business Identification number. This is needed should you decide to join any grant schemes such as the Single Farm Payment scheme or the Elementary/Higher Stewardship schemes.
CPH numbers and SBIN are used a lot when dealing with officialdom so you must keep them safe and have them easily to hand when contacting government bodies as it will cut down the time considerably when dealing with queries.
Herd numbers can be obtained from animal health officers via Defra and consist of the originating country (UK), followed by the individual herd number, in my case, UK200058. This number will precede the animal's individual number. By the way, I'm told you can have the same herd number for both cattle and sheep so if you keep both it would be worth asking when applying. We didn't realise this and ended up with two different herd numbers which added to the paper work!
Check that your land is registered with the Rural Land Registry. If it is, ensure that the maps they hold are correct. All your fields should have an individual number which will need to be recorded on your Single Farm Payment forms. The RLR hold digital maps of the whole country and will send you copies of your land on request. The last time I had to deal with them was to add a narrow strip of land to an existing field. This strip had to have its own identification number which the RLR issued and amended our maps accordingly. They were very efficient and issued us with new maps within a few days. RPA helpline on 0845 6037777
Animal health officers are part of the State Veterinary Service and are regionally based so contact Defra for details of the one that covers your area. You can also find a list on-line. Apart from issuing herd numbers, they are responsible for inspections, compulsory testing for diseases such as TB, keeping records of test dates and notifying you when they are due. By the way, TB testing needs to be done whenever you move cattle between holdings and markets. It is not free and only lasts for a 60 day period!
If you suspect a case of any of the notifiable diseases, such as foot and mouth or blue tongue, then you must inform your animal health officer immediately who will then bring the full force of the State Veterinary Service into play. (www.defra.gov.uk/animalhealth/ about-us/ contact-us/animal-health-offices. htm).
Trading standards officers are employed by your county council and work closely with the State Veterinary Service. They issue movement licences and attend markets, checking on welfare issues and transportation legislation. They will also visit your holding to make similar checks.
After the big foot and mouth epidemic 2001, the rules regarding livestock traceability underwent a huge shake up. Each individual animal has to have its own passport which accompanies it from birth to death recording each movement from holding to market to abattoir. When you buy in cattle they will all ready have a passport so you won't need to register these animals, but you will need to let the British Cattle Movement Service know that they have moved on to your holding.
If you have correctly registered your holding and received you CPH number it is an easy matter to register with the British Cattle Movement service. Telephone their help line on 0845 050 1234. Once registered, you will receive a cattle keeper's handbook, which has detailed information on keeping cattle, plus a supply of bar codes to record movements.
Bar codes are placed in the passport, dated and signed. You do the same for the pre-paid post card in the back of the passport. Detach this and return it to the cattle tracing movement service who will update their database.
You will also be sent the appropriate forms to register new births. These should be done within seven days of the calf being tagged. We tend to tag and register within the first few days of birth rather than risk falling foul of deadlines.
Incidentally, the cattle tracing movement service has a very good website where all movements on and off the holding plus registrations of births and deaths can be made on-line. This is well worth getting to grips with as it can save a lot of time with much of the information pre-populating the fields so all you have to do is add things like individual numbers and dates. www.bcms.gov.uk.
All cattle need to be double-tagged with your herd number and the animal's own individual number. This should be done within 20 days of birth, but diary cattle must have at least one tag fitted within 36 hours of birth. No calf can move off your holding without being tagged and it goes without saying that both tags should carry the same information.
The tags are known as primary and secondary and may be the same type or can be different. We use a small metal tag as our secondary tag which seldom comes out, but can be difficult to read without catching up the animal and a big yellow plastic one as the primary tag. This is easy to read at a distance, but is prone to loss.
Tags must only be ordered from Defra approved manufacturers as these work with the government's ear tag allocation system to ensure that no duplication of numbers occurs. A list of these manufactures can be found on the Defra website www.defra.gov.uk/animalh/id-move/cattle/eartag_makers.htm).
Proper record-keeping is essential. You can use your own systems, use computer software or buy commercial record books from a breed society. The one we use was issued by the British Cattle Movement Service. Whatever shape or form it takes, it must reflect an accurate record of the animals on your holding, recording, identification numbers, breed, sex, date of birth, movement off and on the holding and death, where and to who and details of the dam. This register must be kept for a period of 10 years.
Many cattle keepers fail to understand the importance of keeping an accurate and up to date medicine book. It not only has to record major treatment programmes undertaken by your vet, but also the minor administrations that form part of the day to day running of the holding. The application of antibiotic spray for instance on a small cut, worming routines and pour-ons for the control of fly strike all need to be entered into your medicine book. Trading Standards will certainly ask to see this when making an inspection and any discrepancies will result in penalties and reduced SFP payments.
If by now you are thinking, blow this, I'll start an eBay shop instead, don't despair! In spite of the horror stories of interminable phone queues and clueless operatives on the other end, I've actually found all Defra, BCMS and the Rural Payments Service staff very helpful and efficient and in most cases have had my queries answered without undue waiting times.
One thing you should be aware of and that is situations in farming tend to change literally over night! When the last outbreak of foot and mouth hit we were about to send a couple of heifers to our local market only to see a blanket movement restriction enforced, particularly galling after paying for TB movement tests which went out of date before the restrictions were lifted. In view of this, please check the Defra website (www.defra.gov.uk/farm/index. htm) for up-to-date movement regulations and other information contained within this article.
Record-keeping: Agridata, Thistle Ltd, Brockhole Farm, Morebath, Tiverton, Devon. EX16 9BZ - Computer program to record and manage livestock records. Free, 30 day trial. Tel /Fax: 0870 900 5449 or 0870 321 2225. email: enquiries@agridata.co.uk. www.agridata.co.uk/.
EBLEX: The English Beef and Lamb Executive (EBLEX) was established in 2001 to help the English beef and lamb industry boost its competitiveness and promote its products. It is currently offering a free pocket record-keeping book for cattle keepers. 0870 241 8829 or email brp@eblex.org.uk. www.eblex.org.uk/.
Ear-tags: Ritchey, Masham, Ripon, North Yorkshire, HG4 4ES. Tel: +44 (0)1765 689541 Fax: +44 (0)1765 689851. email: info@ritchey. co.uk. www.ritchey.co.uk/.
Ketchums, Tadworthy, Surrey, KT20 5RE. Telephone: 01737 812218 or 812219.
Fax: 01737 814372.
email: enquiries@ketchums.co.uk. www.ketchums.co.uk/index.htm.
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