ZERO GRAZING: The Wilsam Dairies way.

In only 4 years, Willy Kirwa, the owner of Wilsam Dairies, hardly 40 years old, has worked hard to bring up the enterprise. He has literally put the farm into the limelight of what it is now. It's such a sterling work- in the last 2012 ASK Eldoret Show, he scooped 3 awards- 1st, 2nd, and 4th positions.  But his has not been an easy task... Prior to venturing into dairy farming, Willy had tried his luck in transport and crop farming. Crop farming would take forever to bring in money- about 7 months. And when it was finally harvested by end of the year, the CHRISMAS festivities took the best part, hardly leaving enough for inputs in lieu of the next season.  Transport business also failed to bring in regular income for him. By then he had his original stock of 8 cows which used to graze freely- free range to be exact. He decided to make farm visits; he visited other farmers who were doing similar work.  Talk of birds of a feather... It's in Machakos where he discovered ZERO GRAZING.

 “What you want is by your doorstep yet you do not know,” says Kirwa.

Why ZERO GRAZING?  

ZERO GRAZING improves milk production. The energy which the animal would have spent on free range is consolidated and used for milk production. The number of attendants is also reduced; they seemed to have plenty of time. And by the look of things, I must say I found them well informed and smart. I wouldn’t have noticed them had I not been told. What still amazes me is the way the animals were composed. They appeared stress free - never seemed to be taken aback by such a large team visiting. They are lovely and appealing to the eyes.  No wonder they got 3 awards and the concomitant benefits.

The farmer in Machakos was getting 35 litres of milk per cow whereas all his 8 at home gave an accumulated 30 litres. He came back home and decided to do Zero Grazing and feed his livestock exclusively on dry matter. Of the 8, he isolated 3 and put them on ZERO GRAZING while the rest were left on free range as before. The confined 3 for ZERO GRAZING refused to feed. In desperation, he brought in the other 5 who fed ravenously on the dry matter. That motivated the initial 3 to begin eating. 2 months down the line, the milk production doubled to 70 litres. And since then, things have never been the same for WILSAM Dairies. Exponential growth has been the order of the day. This he attributes to FEEDS; MANAGEMENT; BREED

 “Give me a business that gives you daily revenue by as early as 6:00 a.m. and I’ll show you milk business. How? Doing dairy farming as a business brings in income as early as 5:00 a.m. and continues throughout the day, the week, the month, and throughout the years.  In fact, it continues up to the close of business at 8:00 p.m. when the cows bid you good night”

Those were the opening words of Willy Kirwa when we, 52 farming enthusiasts, paid a visit to WILSAM Farm which he owns and manages with his wife, a farm manager and 2 farm assistants. People came from far and wide- Kisumu; Mombasa; Muranga; Ukambani; Nairobi; Nakuru; Bomet; Eldoret; Kitale; Webuye, etc. Whereas most of us were first timers, several were doing repeat visits; many more will go back again and again from what I heard...  

 Kirwa, who travels a lot, later on visited Israel where he was astounded when he found out the high cost of producing milk.  Therein, due to transport as most ingredients are imported, the costs are high. Upon critical and open thinking, it struck him that he could do dairy farming at a much cheaper cost back here in Kenya where Maize Stover, Wheat Stalks, Rice Husks are readily available locally.  According to Brian Tracey, “The key to success is action,” creativity, openness, and imagination notwithstanding. "The talent of success is nothing more than doing what you can do well; and doing well whatever you do, without a thought of fame," adds Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. And Zig Ziglar says that the skill to do comes from doing. Therefore, you must place yourself in a position to practice these skills. 

Coupled with enthusiasm, these principles work to bring about fast, predictable improvements in performance and results. The faster you learn and apply them, the faster you will move ahead.  It was Frank Tibolt who once said, “We should be taught NOT TO WAIT for inspiration to start a thing. Action always generates inspiration. Inspiration seldom generates action.”

“Almost always, the creative dedicated minority has made the world better,” as Martin Luther King, Jr. observed.

All successful people are forever attempting to expand their horizons; to stretch their minds. Thomas Carlyle put it beautifully when he said, "Once the mind has been expanded by a big idea, it will never go back to its original state." Carlyle was right, when you have expanded your mind you have developed a greater awareness, and awareness is not something you can lose, asserts Bob Proctor... Willy is back in Israel for updates on the latest dairy technology; some new things have just come up. He doesn’t let anything novel pass him by- he looks for opportunities in every vista available. 

Feeds

The cows are exclusively fed on dry matter. Dry matter is more important than green matter in dairy feeds as the volume consumed is less and the water intake is enhanced. A cow which consumes 80kgs of green matter takes only 40kgs of dry matter. Then it takes 60 litres of water on average. It's worth noting that 80% of milk is composed of water!!!!!!!!!!!

The dry matter is made up of roughly chopped 

§  1  bag Bhoma Rhodes grass;

§  1 bag Wheat Straw; 

§  1 bag Maize Stover; 

§  1 bag Rice husks 

This makes up approximately 120kg of feed from the 4 bags based on an assumption of 30 kgs per bag of each input. Of these, the most critical component is the BHOMA RHODES. 

“Ideally, you should be doing 4 bags of BHOMA RHODES, but since it is expensive and we are aiming to drive down costs, we add fillers- what would be called ''waste'' material (maize stovers, rice husks, wheat straws),” says Kirwa.

These are thoroughly mixed with 2 litres of molasses in 15 litres of lukewarm water.  Thereafter the moist mixture is compacted in plastic drums. How many drums they will fill depend on drum size, muscle power and weight (compacting ability).  The use of metal drums is discouraged owing to rust. The mixture, in the drums of course, are then sealed with polythene sheet and put in the sun to ferment to maturity. It’s advisable that the chopping is medium size so as to allow for chewing rather than swallowing. This is necessary for the development and built up of rumen. The moisturised feeds become ready for consumption in three days. By then it is softer and tastier. This feed can last for long, too.

His herd of 36 animals consumes 2-2.5 drums of this in a day.  Each mature in-milk cow consumes 35 – 40 kgs daily. The maximum is about 40 kg daily for a cow that is in full milk production. Note that the quantity consumed per cow reduces owing to the animal size and status- in-milk, in-calf, expectant heifers, young calves... Calves and heifers are also fed on the same feed. Calves are only allowed to suckle from their mothers for two days after which they are introduced to artificial feeding. Solid salt lick is also provided adlib and a cow is estimated to consume between 130-150g/day. This is split up into 3 as they are milked thrice daily. 

When asked about the use of UREA to substitute for molasses in the feeds, Kirwa said that that requires much more technology than he has access to. Otherwise, the unfortunate herd deaths as have been reported elsewhere.

Water is provided adlib and at body temperature. Cows take small quantities of cold water; instead, they drink plenty of the lukewarm one. That explains why within the cowshed, the water is in the open area of the confinement.

It is advisable to Store feeds enough for your animals to last for at least a year. Use this to know the estimates required-365days x 40kgs x #cows.

Of the 18 in–milk cows, he gets between 350 and 370 litres of milk daily.

Milk producing cows are given dairy meal in addition to the dry matter. “Don’t buy dairy meal,” he warns. “Make your own”, he advises. “It has cost implications,” he adds. If he were feeding 35 cows 2kgs of dairy meal each, he would save between Kshs. 21,000 and Kshs. 26,250 monthly. This saving doubles when he gives each cow 4kgs.

Dairy meal administration

>15litres 4kgs per day

<15litres 2kgs per day

Costs

Factory made                    Homemade   Variance       Savings

2000-2250                        1400-1500    500-750       18,000-22,500

Dairy meal composition

Ingredient Quantity Availability

Cotton Seed Cake 05kg Dealers

Wheat Pollard 05kg Millers

Maize Flour 10kg Home made

Rice Germ 15kg Rice factory

Wheat Bran 18kg Millers

Maize Bran 15kg Millers

High Phosphorous 01kg Agrovet

Dairy Lime 01kg Agrovet

PS:

Lucerne can be used to substitute for COTTON SEED CAKE;

Soya is too expensive;

Sunflower fattens and this inhibits milk production. It’s instead, better for the beef cattle.  As to the much publicized fodder millet, Willy has just brought in the seeds. Until he gets it right, he doesn’t want to comment. This homemade dairy meal costs between Kshs. 1400 and 1500 per bag.

Milking

A dairy cow is milked for 10months in a year and left to dry for 2 months just before delivery. Milking at the farm is mechanized. The cows are trained and when the equipment is switched on, and gates opened, the cows literally queue to await their turns. The machine milks four cows at a go as the dairy meal is fed to the cow during process. In approximately 5 minutes the milking is complete and another lot gets in.

Breeding 

He says the best cows are the ones you breed yourself. So he serves his dairy cows using conventional semen and sexed semen. Sexed semen is used only on heifers. From his experience, sexed semen works best in heifers; >90% efficacy. He uses semen from CAIS, Worldwide Sires and ABS Semex.

Medication

Spraying of the animals is done weekly within the farm. In fact, WILSAM Dairies is like a miniature Agrovet, stocked with all kinds of animal medicine. When need arises, vets are called in and paid for the services that cannot be administered by the farm workers.

Plans  

With over 350 litres daily, it’s not so economical to operate without a chilling plant. So he plans to bring in a milk-cooler. He’s already put up a structure  for it. When that happens, he says he’ll be in a better position to negotiate with the milk processors for better terms. Besides, savings made on transport cost when the processors collect milk from his yard would also be huge financial boost for him.

Meanwhile, he intends to add 20 more cows into the herd in the next couple of months as well as build a bigger biogas plant; he had a small smaller one which he’s broken down to pave way for the bigger one. Wilsam is aiming at milking 40 cows, more cow dung, and at least 1,200 litres per day! At 30 bob per litre, we are looking at 36,000/- per day gross, or 1,080,000/- per month gross, or 12,960,000 gross per year!!

There is “Good news” for his animals. They might soon be sleeping on mattresses when he buys enough for all. He has begun bringing in these mattresses albeit gradually given the high costs involved. Meanwhile, they make do with straw on the murram floor which is comparatively warm unlike the concrete one

For the feeds’ needs, he has planted 10 acres of Bhoma Rhodes grass

Poultry 

From a humble beginning of 200 chicks, a plan hatched in flight as he came back from ISRAEL, he now has approximately 700, and a structure that can take in up to 1000 birds. His estimated daily income from this is Kshs. 1700. Within the 18 months, he gets a net of about Kshs. 300,000. He saves a minimum of Kshs. 25,000 on the homemade feeds-maize flour, maize bran, etc. There are also layers whose eggs sell for Kshs. 30 each. In 21 days these bring on board chicks.

For this farm, with an average income of about Kshs. 900,000 per month, the future is brighter than ever before.  The visit was quite an eye opener.  We came, saw and I‘m now believing in its possibility, seeing it as it is done. Everything is possible for everyone who believes.  This thing is doable!!!!!!!!!!!!!"People with the best intentions will often give you advice on why you shouldn’t take a risk because of what could happen. While some of what they say may be true, you should never allow them to get their negative anchors into your mind because, like them, you too will begin to sink. Next time this happens, throw them a life-line, and ask them what is good about their situation." - Bob Proctor