As wild as the Irish calf trade has been, day-old dairy-beef calves are making $1,500 in the US as the American beef herd remains at a 70-year low. This has led to a suggestion carried in a recent publication from the Idaho Dairymens Association that, for the average dairy farmer there, beef calves could offer an opportunity to double their profits per cow.

The paper states that if calf prices remain constant that dairy profitability may be driven more by beef calves than marginal milk production. It was a line I never expected to see but that’s the lie of the land in the USA.