Farmer Writes: complaining about the weather makes us sound like a broken record

It feels like every second article I’ve written this summer has been talking about the weather, I’m starting to sound like a broken record! It’s been see-sawing from good to bad to good all summer. There’s no doubt that, until recently, it was a much better year than last. But by God has it turned bad in the last two weeks. It’s been deluge after deluge, day after day after day!

Land around here is just completely saturated.

Majority of cattle housed

I have all but five cows housed

The weanling calves are still at grass but, to be honest, the wisdom of this is questionable. The bulls, in particular, are doing quite a bit of damage, mostly because I am strip grazing them as they are grazing fairly heavy covers and they must walk back across the field to get to the troughs.

The need to house

I doubt if they are gaining much in the way of live weight as they spend a lot of their time standing around the gate waiting to be fed or cowering behind the hedge trying to get some shelter from the incessant rain.

’The weather is driving me insane’

Having most of my cows housed is bad enough but the thoughts of having to house my calves in the middle of September – when they normally wouldn’t be housed until nearly the middle of November – may just be enough to drive me completely insane.

Cattle scanned

Cows were scanned two weeks ago and everything went fairly well. I have three empty cows and another two that I will probably let go as they aren’t calving until March, which is just too late for my system.

All heifers and cows received their Bovivac S salmonella vaccine last week and anything within three months of calving will receive their scour vaccine next week, along with two mineral boluses. The bolus contains iodine, copper, cobalt and selenium.

Two boluses are given to cows two months before calving. They last six months, which covers the animal through the calving period and allows four months cover to get her back in calf.

Dead calf and added costs

Last year was the first year I started bolusing the cows as I had a calf born dead and, after a lab investigation, the cause was found to be low selenium. It is, of course, another cost but they definitely seem to be doing their job.

Flood Damage Relief Scheme

It’s good to see that the Dep of Agriculture has announced its Flood Damage Relief Scheme.

The application form can be downloaded from the department website or will also be available from Teagasc, IFA or Inishowen co-op.

The form is fairly straightforward and is easy to fill out.

Farmers can apply for aid under four different headings.

In fairness, I do think the Department genuinely wants the scheme to be simple and they want money to be paid out to those who need it as soon as and with as little red tape as possible. But, unfortunately, this scheme does not cover everybody.

There is no mention of crops, be it standing silage crops, potatoes or grain, and there are many farmers who have lost significant amounts of crops.

The IFA, I must say, are doing a good job and I’m sure will launch an appeal with the Department to try to help anyone not yet covered.

De minimis aid

There is also the issue of the scheme falling under de minimis aid. Which means that €15,000 is the limit in any three-year period. For 90% of farmers applying, this will not be an issue as they will be nowhere near this amount. But for the small percentage of farmers who were very severely hit, this could be a problem.

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