Fourteen farms, five judges and one week of judging. Those are the opening statistics from the inaugural Grassland Farmer of the Year awards.
Applications were whittled down based on rankings under five categories; grass growth, grazing infrastructure, grass utilisation, soil fertility, reseeding policy and carbon footprint.
Over the next two weeks, we will profile the candidates.
Peter Mongey, Meath
When Peter Mongey took over the family farm near Slane in 2007, the milking platform was just 10ha.
Ten years later, the milking platform has expanded to 29ha through land purchase and leasing.
There are 105 cows being milked this year. The stocking rate on the milking platform is high at over 3.55 cows/ha, but outside blocks are used to produce silage.
Heifers have been contract-reared since 2014 and three cuts of silage are made on the outside farms.
Peter has been measuring grass for the past nine years and says it has been a crucial part of his development.
He is part of a small grass measuring group that measures grass on each other’s farms every week in rotation.
Average grass growth in 2015 and 2016 was 14.8t/ha, but growth is up by over 2t/ha this year to date, so Peter reckons the farm will grow almost 17t/ha in 2017.
Peter plans to milk between 112 and 115 cows next year, which will be a stocking rate of 3.86 cows/ha.
To do this, he needs to grow an average of 15.5t/ha across the whole farm. He fed 584kg of meal last year.
Peter has the farm laid out in 17 paddocks suitable for three grazings each. He has over 4km of farm roadways and plenty of access points into paddocks.
The herd of Holstein Friesian cows are strip-grazed most days to assist in getting a good clean-out.
Over 76% of the farm has been reseeded over the last six years. His preference is to reseed using a direct drill method using either a Guttler or a Moore drill. Aston Energy, Aspect and Dunluce with clover were sown this year.
Michael Magan, Longford
Michael is farming with his father Mike on a very dry vein of land at Kilashee, Co Longford. The Magans are milking 160 cows on a 36ha milking block, so the stocking rate is exceptionally high at 4.44 cows/ha.
To overcome the high stocking rate, the Magans are focusing on growing a lot of grass, with average growth in 2015 and 2016 of 18t/ha.
Extra land was purchased recently, most of which is currently in maize, but this will be put back to grass next year, so cow numbers will increase.
The maize is used as a supplement in the spring and autumn when demand for grass exceeds supply. About 1.2t/cow of meal is fed.
No topping is done, but seven of the 21 paddocks on the farm were cut for silage at some point this year.
Paddocks are closed from 8 October and the target is to close the farm at an average farm cover of 550kg/ha or higher.
Turnout in spring is in early February, with Michael using the spring rotation planner to allocate grass.
He wants to stretch out the first round of grazing to 5 April before starting the second round. The Magans are part of the grass variety evaluation study and they use all monocultures when reseeding.
Michael says he prefers to get all reseeding done by 1 June at the latest, which allows for the shortest turnaround time of around 40 days. Ploughing is the method of choice on this farm.
There has been a big push on soil fertility over the last few years, with extra phosphorus and potash being spread on paddocks with a low index after soil sampling.
Tim Crowley, Cork
Tim is heading up the competition in the young farmer category. He is farming in partnership with his father Dan outside Bandon, Co Cork.
When Tim is not playing rugby for Bandon, he is busy at home on the expanding dairy farm. Extra land was purchased in 2016 which will bring the milking platform to 60ha next year. They plan to milk 145 cows, with the long-term goal of milking 200 cows.
Average grass growth in 2015 and 2016 was 14.5t/ha, including the new ground. The herd was fed 685kg of meal in 2016 and they expect to feed around 500kg this year.
A phosphorus deficiency in March affected production and while the herd was budgeted to produce 440kg MS/cow this year, it is more likely to end up at between 400kg and 420kg/cow.
Phosphorus supplementation in the meal cured the deficiency. Extra phosphorus and potassium is being spread to bring up the soil fertility status of the newly acquired land.
While this land is exceptionally good, some of it was in forestry, so soil fertility is low.
Urea is blanket-spread for the first two rounds in spring, followed by two bags/acre of 18:6:12. Sulphur CAN is used for the rest of the year, with another two bags/acre of 18:6:12 and one bag per acre of 0:0:50 spread in the autumn.
Tim and Dan are part of the Teagasc monoculture study, so only sow monoculture grass varieties. Within these, they have a preference for tetraploid varieties, as Tim says he gets better clean-outs, nicer swards, quicker grazings and less of a need to pre-mow or cut for bales compared with diploids.
Grazing infrastructure is excellent, with 4.5m wide roadways, 220 gallon water troughs and 1.25in water pipes.
Francis Clune, Clare
Francis is milking one herd of cows on two farms in Tulla, Co Clare. Most of the time, the herd of 103 cows are milked on the home farm with four or five days of each rotation spent on an outfarm about one mile up the road.
Overall, there are 30ha between the two farms for cows. Francis measures grass on the larger block twice a week.
Grazing infrastructure is excellent – by far the best in the competition, with every paddock having multiple access points from excellent farm roadways and multiple water troughs in each paddock.
There is only one acre of the farm not reseeded since Francis started farming in 1989.
He uses grass seed mixes and has a preference for diploids, as they provide better ground cover.
Average grass growth over the last two years was 14.35t/ha, but by early September, the farm had grown 14.4t/ha so Francis expects the overall growth to be well up in 2017.
Milk output per cow was 409kg in 2016 from 750kg of meal fed.
Francis spreads about 220 units/acre of nitrogen across the farm. Most of the slurry is spread in spring and one bag/acre of 10:10:20 is spread in April, with lime being spread at a rate of 1.5t to 2t/acre.
Heffernans – Kilkenny
Billy Heffernan and his sons Liam and Mark are farming in Dunamaggin, Co Kilkenny. At 385 cows, they farm the largest herd in the competition.
The Heffernans have expanded rapidly over the last 10 years, having moved from a mixed farm with dairy, beef, tillage and sheep to all-dairy.
They are farming 476 acres in total between owned and leased land.
The milking platform of 132ha is carrying 385 this year, which is a stocking rate of 2.9 cows/ha. The plan is to increase the stocking rate to 3.3 cows/ha next year by milking 450 cows.
Billy says that he expects the farm to grow 19t/ha in 2017, as the growth to early September was 3t/ha ahead of the same period last year. The farm grew 16t/ha in 2016.
The herd of cows are primarily British Friesian that will produce close to 465kg of milk solids from around 500kg of meal.
The farm is laid out in 35 paddocks. Getting paddocks bigger than 10 or 15 acres is a challenge at this scale, so having smaller paddocks than they would like is a necessity.
Grazing infrastructure is excellent, with 5m-wide farm roadways and 400- and 550-gallon water troughs in paddocks.
This is a real family farm with all three members of the family doing most of the work. Liam is the main man for measuring grass, doing most of the weekly walks.
The farm is in a great grass-growing part of the country, being about 300ft above sea level, and gets between 750mm and 950mm of rain per year.
Star grazers part II: more finalists in Grassland farmer of the year