Keep every detail of your cows to maximise earnings

Lawrence Njugunah in his farm in Ndenderu, Kiambu. PHOTO | JENNIFER MUIRURI |

What you need to know:

  • Njugunah insists that farmers ought to take record keeping seriously.
  • He has extended the records to milk production.

The long-winded road stretches to Karura ka Nyaga in Ndenderu, Kikuyu, on the outskirts of Nairobi.

The Seeds of Gold team is here to meet Lawrence Njugunah, who runs one of the biggest dairy farms in the area.

We find the farmer busy harvesting napier grass for his cows. Dressed in a blue overcoat and gumboots, he leads us to his cow pens, where his big-bodied American breed Holstein cows are feeding.

Njugunah owns 37 animals, 20 are lactating, three are heifers, four in-calf heifers and the rest are calves.

The farmer says the desire to have high-yields made him keep the Holstein breed.

“I breed the cows myself to ensure I have the best. I check for their backbone, which should be straight, for best breed. I also ensure that the cow has a high hip and a lower pin,” he says.

“If the hips are lower than the pins, then that is a defect. The rib cage should be wide enough and the udder must be well-attached, with the tits short, medium-sized and close to each other.”

Njugunah is an ardent keeper of his animals’ records, what has made him run a successful farm. He records every single milestone of the cows on cards that allow him to keep track of his brood.

This starts with every cow having a yellow ear tag with a code number. The cards indicate the cow’s name, the bull used for siring and the date the animal was born. It also shows the code numbers of the bull, the dame (mother) and the breed of each parent.

“The card also contains information regarding the calving intervals. I am also able to tell when each of the cows was born and how they are faring on.”

TAKE RECORD KEEPING SERIOUSLY

Njugunah insists that farmers ought to take record keeping seriously.

“If you do not keep records, you are likely to inbreed. The record cards also have treatment dates for ailments such as foot and mouth disease, which can wipe out an entire brood,” says Njuguna, who has records of his cows since he started.

“Records help me in knowing the high yielders. There are certain animals I want to follow from time to time and there are animals from a ‘good family’ with high-yield that I would not want to sell by mistake.”

The farmer sells his milk to Kiambaa Dairy Co-operative as well as from his home, where residents come to buy.

He further supplies it to traders at Ndenderu shopping centre as well as to local secondary schools.

He has extended the records to milk production. The record cards show how much milk each cow produced in the morning and in the evening, as well as the litres sold to the co-operative, at home and to traders and schools.

“From the cards, I can tell a cow is sick if it produces less milk and I am able to know what I can do about it to increase milk production. Cows on heat generally produce less milk.”

On the day Seeds of Gold team visited him, Njugunah had milked 116 litres early morning from some of his cows. From the records, we could see he had sold 36 litres at the gate and 79.9 litres to the co-operative society.

He sells a litre of milk to the co-operative at Sh36 and Sh50 per litre to the locals.

“From the morning sales, I normally earn Sh4,600 and about the same or more in the evening.”

Njugunah gives the cows commercial feeds and napier grass.

“I grow my own fodder, harvest and store in an underground silo for use during the dry season.”

He complements the silage with maize germ, wheat bran and pollard. To complete the meal, he offers the cows fresh water and yeast from a local brewery, which he says is rich in protein as dairy cows require protein for milk production and growth.

HOUSE RESEMBLED A MANYATTA

But it has not been an easy ride for the farmer. His journey began over 30 years ago, when he was a young primary school teacher.

He started dairy farming in 1982 with a capital of Sh2,000 that he used to buy two cows. Each cow would produce about six litres of milk, which he would sell to neighbours and colleagues.

“I sold a bottle between 50 cents and Sh1 and would get Sh60 in a day,” he recalls.

The farmer graduated from selling milk in bottles to using a van as his brood increased.

“My home resembled a Maasai manyatta because I had so many cows. My herd grew to about 60 animals. In those days, cows were cheap.”

Soon, however, the Kenya Dairy Board and the police were on his case since it was illegal to sell unlicensed milk. Njugunah, who was then selling milk in Pangani and along Juja Road, Nairobi, resorted to hawk from home to home.

His big break came in 1987 when he landed a contract to supply 100 litres of milk to the United Nations headquarters in Gigiri. The contract would last the next 18 years. It did not only boost Njugunah’s income, but also sent him to early retirement in 1994, making dairy farming his main project.

His main challenge is low milk prices. “If the cooperative would buy milk at more than Sh40, then we would be making good profit.” Getting labour also poses a major hurdle.

“Our day begins at 3:45am and ends at 5pm. We then work from Monday to Monday.”