Clostridia vaccine: Around this time of year there are always a number of incidences of blackleg and clostridia disease, which result in sudden death of weanlings.

This is especially frustrating where weanlings are coming ready for sale. It’s sometimes surprising the number of farms that don’t bother with a clostridia vaccine.

If clostridia disease has been a problem on your farm in the past, it’s important that you vaccinate against it to prevent sudden deaths. The 10-in-1 vaccines are the best to use for maximum protection.

It’s a two-shot programme and it’s very important to follow up with the second shot four to six weeks after the initial shot. This vaccine will give six-months cover for a number of these diseases. Take care when injecting that you use gloves and that the needle is changed often.

Unsightly vaccination lumps don’t look good in the sales ring and can lead to losses in carcase weight and cut quality. Consult with your vet as to vaccinate or not.

Feeding dairy beef calves: In theory, if calves are grazing good-quality grass full of leaf with no stem, this should be sufficient to achieve good liveweight gain in calves.

Talking to farmers in dairy beef systems, many of them continue to feed meal 1kg/head/day during summer months. At €400/tonne, a kg/head/day will cost €0.40/head/day.

Meal feeding is a good herding tool for many, especially on part-time farms. Once calves come to trough and feed, you can eliminate a lot of sickness. It also keeps stock settled during periods of wet, cold weather and makes moving them a lot easier.

A lot of dairy beef farmers feel it’s easier to feed concentrates through the grazing season rather than having to house and feed more concentrates at the end of the finishing period.

National Livestock Show: All roads lead to the FBD National Livestock Show in Tullamore next Sunday 11 August. It’s a great day out with the best of Irish livestock competing in hundreds of classes during the day. It’s also a celebration of all that is good about our livestock industry.

The Irish Farmers Journal livestock team will be there in our usual spot overlooking the cattle rings – be sure to pop in for a chat with the team.

We will be running live demos from 10.30-2.30pm every hour where we will discuss some of the challenges and opportunities for each sector.

Balla Mart Event: The Irish Farmers’ Association is running a special mart event on the suckler cow and trade on Thursday 8 August at 7.30pm in the Aurivo mart in Balla in Co Mayo.

Declan Hanrahan will give an outline on supports needed for the sector. I’ll be talking about the weanling trade and what the outlook is like for the rest of 2024.

Stephen Hannon will outline what livestock exporters are buying and what type of weanlings they want, while TJ Duffy from MSD will talk about animal health, housing and vaccination of weanlings.

Anne Mitchell will also address the meeting on Farm Safety. Everybody is welcome.