The good spell of weather over the bank holiday weekend saw massive progress in spring planting. Even the coastal regions, plagued by fog, saw the sun break through on Monday.

Farmers in many areas have now effectively finished sowing spring grain crops, but the shadow of the spring still hangs over the sector. Those pockets worst affected by the weather still have considerable work to do – particularly along the south coast from Cork up to Wexford. Many farmers on heavier land and right on the coast only began planting last Friday, and need better weather than is being forecast for the coming days.

Potato planting has belatedly started, but the early potato crop in the southern half of the country has almost completely fallen foul of the late spring.

Goldcrop

Certified spring barley seed supplies are now exhausted. There may be farmers with barley seed they are not now going to use. They should make contact with their merchant, as there may be a demand for it. Grain seed will also be required for bird cover, and indeed oats seed for catch crops post-harvest might be worth sourcing.

Maize seed demand is way up – possibly an extra 8,000ha of seed has been purchased. Maize plastic is now also in short supply due to this unforeseen demand.

Planting maize without plastic is only feasible if using an early maturing variety. Farmers need to be sure they have a suitable variety.

Farmer and contractor, Killavullen Co Cork

It has been nearly impossible to get work done this spring. We have two harrows and two drills working flat out to catch up. A lot of the barley ground has been planted.

We’ve had to increase sowing rates to 12-13 stone/acre, and seed supplies are very scarce. We are finished our own ground, but have a nice bit to do for others. There will be a cut-off point for grain crops, somewhere in mid-May. Silage work is starting. There’s going to be no letup.

Potato grower, Kilkenny

We’ve planted 25% of the potatoes. We got about 15 acres planted back in mid-April, but we only got going again in the last week. We need another six good days to get them all in.

We planted early turnips today – two months late. The last spring like this was back in 1984. There were a lot more growers on smaller acreage back then, so the work was wrapped up quickly. We had a drought that year and ended up with 3t/acre of British Queens.

We have irrigation equipment to cope with drought now, but let’s hope the weather is favourable. It would keep costs more manageable.

Agri-contractor, Tagoat, Co Wexford

We’re about 75% through the spring corn. This is a real early potato area. There is a small acreage planted, but nothing like normal. Beans have been planted in recent days, about two months behind other years.

The winter corn looks good considering the winter weather it’s had, although the tramlines are 2ft deep.

We’ve had to put a bigger tractor on the sprayer. The Fendt 516 would usually cope easily but couldn’t pull a full sprayer through the tramlines. That’s a real sign of how wet land still is.

IFA tillage committee chair Mark Browne says the sector cannot afford any CAP payment cuts, saying: “Our product prices have hardly changed in 30 years, but our costs are rising year-on-year.” He noted the proposed 5% cut in the CAP budget, and called on the Irish Government to “lead the charge” on finding the extra funding to overturn such a cut.

While welcoming the commitment to make the greening element of the CAP more workable, Browne said it was critical that farmers’ basic payments are not tampered with.

“Most tillage farmers suffered a cut of around 30% in the last CAP reform. Another cut would be a death knell for tillage farming, which is on it’s knees after a few tough years.”

Browne highlighted all the extra demands placed on tillage farmers in the last few years.

“Some important pesticides have been banned, which is a direct cost to farmers. The level of reporting required now imposes a significant administrative burden on farmers,” he said. “Yet grain from all over the world, grown with no regulations at all, comes in and undermines our price. Only a decent basic payment will keep us in business.”

Browne also called for recognition of the need for scale in tillage farming when debating the capping of payments.