Today I feel like I am on top of my workload (for a few hours at least). There was no calving yesterday, but there were seven calves born so far this morning!

I like to take the calf away from the cow as soon as possible and ensure they receive 2 litres or more of colostrum. If the calf does not suck they have to be tubed, but it is obviously preferable if they do suckle. The calving season half way mark is within easy reach and another morning like this today will see us there, and judging by the way cows are springing up there will be no let up for a while.

The cows are divided into two groups, with the fresh group (up to five days after calving) inside on good bales of silage, and the main group of calved cows out on grass full time. Cows are getting 2kg of meal and the cows in the calving unit are getting 1kg.

The weather has been fantastic so far, ground conditions are great, even one of the “softer” paddocks has been grazed already and now they are working their way through one of the heavier covers which has about 1,800 on it. Slurry has been spread at 2,500 gallons per acre on the grazed paddocks both at home and on the outside farm where some of the lighter weanlings are grazing, so far I have been doing this job myself.

I measured the soil temperature at 6.1°C at 9am this morning. The weather forecast is looking alright, so I decided to arrange for the contractor to get moving on the first application of fertilizer for the year. As it is almost the middle of February I am going to spread a bag of urea per acre across the entire farm.

I took the first load of bull calves to the mart in Corrin earlier this week. They were mostly Friesians and some Montbeliard cross Friesians. They were only aged from one week to 10 days old, but had to go as the calf house was at full capacity and it will cut down on labour. Prices ranged from a mere €60 to €101. I sold one small free-martin heifer for the princely sum of €5!

Young farmers

I have been trying to keep an eye on what is going on with the clarification of the definition of an “old young farmer”. I never thought at 37 years that I would be considered old!

Surely if the powers that be in Europe have identified that young farmers under 40 are desirable and badly needed in the industry then I should not to be discriminated because I have been farming in my own right for longer than five years?

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Watch: Grazing conditions on Tom Dinneen's farm