Denis Lehane's top tips for mart success in 2022
Kilmallock Mart operating during the Covid restrictions. For goodness' sake, give the man or woman in change of a mart a break. Picture: James Treacy.
Now I'm hardly the man to preach to anyone going to the mart in 2022. The greatest boast I can make is that I am still around.
I still have a few cattle to my name, and that's about it. But sure, I suppose that isn't so bad at the end of the day. In a business that has lost so many, survival in beef farming could nowadays be almost seen as a success.
And with regards to advice, isn't it sometimes the case that the right lousy player goes on to make an inspirational manager. And particularly in farming, haven't we seen many examples down through the years of advice given by so-called experts not only guide farmers into the ground but into bankruptcy.
So perhaps a few tips from a struggling farmer like me to the mart-going farmer mightn't be the worst exercise in the world. Indeed it might be the right way to begin the new year.
For what it's worth here are my top 10 tips for the mart farmer of 2022.
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Forget about armchair farming, get off your backside and purchase a few cattle. There is nothing like the sight of a few cattle arriving in the yard to give a fellow a lift. It's better for you than any booster jab. Better than any Christmas gifts of socks and underwear.
And you don't have to wait until the marts reopen to make a cattle purchase. For heaven's sake, the country is awash with able cattlemen who can truck cattle to the farm directly.
Most are only a phone call away. So go on, get off your bum and stay in the game.
I know it's hard to get young minds away from them tiny screens, but you must! You have no other choice. I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but you won't be around forever. Even the greatest of farmers will have to hang up their boots at some stage.
The Bull McCabe might have been crazy like a fox, but at least he had Tadhg. Do you have a Tadhg?
Make 2022 the year you find your Tadhg. The future of our business depends on finding boys and girls interested and willing to carry on the noble pursuit of cattle farming.
I realise now with this internet malarky that every mart is local. But my dear man, or indeed woman, there is a big difference between a mart in Thurles and the mart in Timbuktu. The mart in Timbuktu won't support the local economy.
It's not the mart you grew up in. It's not the mart ring your grandfather called home. Give up cigarettes, give up drink, give up courting for the new year, but don't give up on your local mart.
I have seen a lot of good mart managers leave the stage in the recent past. Now I can't say for sure why they left but I dare say it might have a lot to do with yourself. And you there moaning about a bad internet connection. Or cribbing about the bullock you purchased who you felt wasn't half as pleasing on the eye in the flesh as he was on the screen.
For goodness' sake, give the man or woman in change of a mart a break. These are unprecedented, hard, difficult times for us all. Don't make them any more difficult by ranting about things that are really out of a mart manager's control.
If you purchase the wrong animal online that's your fault, and if your internet isn't firing on all cylinders, well that's hardly a mart manager's fault. Stop behaving like a recently squeezed old bull. Cheer up my friend.
Make 2022 the year you show your local mart manager that you really care.
Say what you like about the last generation of cattle farmers but they were serious operators.
In the days when auctioneers like Jack McGraw held sway over the ring, I'm telling you, you needed some confidence to raise that hand and buy a bullock. Jack took no prisoners. There were no half measures back then, you were either in the race or you were out of it.
In my younger days, I witnessed men buy cattle with more drink on board than a loaded Guinness lorry leaving the brewery at half seven in the morning.
Try it sometime. Try purchasing an animal with a few jars on board, I'm telling you when you end up buying something that resembles a goat instead of a bullock you won't be long agreeing with me that the old boys were in a league of their own.
When I was a young fellow the suckler farmer was right up there with the dairy farmer. Well, maybe not right up there, but he was close. A new jeep every couple of years. The pick of the ladies at Macra dances, the suckler man was ahead of the game in so many ways.
Producing super cattle. Making super money. They deserved serious credit.
They have been abandoned. So what has happened since? Well for the few that remain, it means working long hours off-farm to ensure a livelihood on-farm.
The greatest failing in farming in the past 30 years has been the abandonment of the suckler farmer. The suckler farmer has been thrown under the wheels of the dairy juggernaut. Cast aside like yesterday's newspaper.
The world hasn't forgotten how to eat beef so why have we forgotten about the suckler farmer. Make 2022 the year the struggling suckler farmer is supported properly.
If you work in a bank, building society or credit union, go gently on the person struggling to bring the best of what the land can produce to your table.
Farmers like you and me have never let the nation down before, so why would we do it know? Don't be coming down so hard on them now when clearly it has become a struggle.
Yes, the balance sheets may not look good. But look at the bigger picture. It's high time banks moved back from staring at the computer screen, for decision-making, and looked compassionately at the person seated in front of them.
If you drive a truck and haul cattle from post to pillar, you surely have a right good story to tell.
Most hauliers are second or third generation cattlemen at this stage. And as such would have tales to tell, not only about their own career, but also from those who have gone before. Give us all a thrill and put pen to paper before the stories, like the people, are gone for sure.
Pray that by this time next year a remedy will have been found for Covid and that we will be allowed return to the mart in a fashion similar to pre-covid times. Looking at a bullock on a tiny screen is no way to look at a bullock.
It's like looking at a glorious sunset with a cardboard box over your head. Only in the flesh can the full picture be seen. And only in the mart can proper straightforward business be done.
This is one of the most important tips of all.
How in the name of blazes can you keep up to date and in touch with livestock trends if you don't scour through weekly mart reports. These mart reports to the farmer (particularly in the ), are about as essential as a stick is to a cattle drover.
