The positive breeding performance in Newford Farm, Athenry, that was reported during the breeding season has this week been confirmed by scanning results.

Cows were scanned on Tuesday, with 93 out of the 99 cows put forward for breeding (four of the 103 cows’ rearing calves were not put forward due to reasons for culling) scanned in-calf.

Within this, there are four cows carrying twin calves, similar to the situation in 2016.

The positive breeding performance is strengthened by the fact that the farm practised a 10-week breeding period, consisting of six weeks of AI by farm manager Matthew Murphy followed by four weeks of breeding with the two stock bulls.

Looking closer at the figures, Matthew says 64 cows held to first service, with 18 holding to the second service, while the two stock bulls served 11 cows

This has laid the foundation for another tight calving spread in 2018.

Maiden heifers

Breeding in maiden heifers, which are being contract-reared on the farm of Billy Gilmore, was also positive, with 23 of the 26 heifers put forward for breeding scanned in-calf to AI.

Some 22 of these held to first service. These heifers were bred to the Limousin bull Towthorpe Dubai, which has a calving difficulty of 4.6% at 99% reliability and a predicted carcase weight of 26kg, also with 99% reliability.

Animal performance

The tight calving spread in spring, where 82% of cows calved within six weeks (calving spread of 2 February to 22 April), and the favourable weather up until recent weeks has witnessed 2017-born progeny doing an excellent thrive, as can be seen in the video above taken on 20 July.

The most recent weighing on 22 June saw bull calves average 196kg or an average daily liveweight gain of 1.29kg/day.

Taking a similar daily liveweight gain since, bull calves are now likely to be averaging close to 250kg. Heifer calves weighed an average of 178kg on 22 June with an average daily gain of 1.24kg.

Cows and calves were split into three grazing groups a few weeks ago by removing the first calvers and grouping on their own.

This is allowing preferential treatment to be given to this group. All calves recently received a worm dose targeting lungworm and male calves were also castrated.

This will allow the groups to be continue to be run as they are.

Beef cattle

Beef cattle were weighed on 11 July. Heifers are being run on the Gort na hAbhainn land block, while steers are being run in the recently acquired rented land block which is located a few miles from the main block.

Steers averaged 498kg and with an average age of 15.75 months, this gives a daily liveweight gain of 0.94kg from birth, while steers have gained 0.92kg from turnout to weighing.

Heifers averaged 487kg, achieving an average daily gain of 0.93kg since birth and 0.98kg since turnout.

As the target is to maximise the number of animals slaughtered off grass, meal feeding was introduced on 1 August to heifers and steers weighing in excess of 520kg.

Meal feeding will be increased to 5kg for a six- to eight-week period with the aim of finishing 34 of the 42 heifers off grass and 18 of the 47 steers. The remainder of animals will be housed for finishing.

Heavy rainfall

The farm has received over 130mm of rainfall in July, with ground conditions starting to feel the effects of continuous heavy rainfall.

This is hampering grass utilisation, with greater difficulty cleaning out paddocks in recent days.

This contrasts with the conditions seen up to 10 days ago, when cleaning out of paddocks was excellent, as demonstrated in the video.

Matthew says that current management is aimed at balancing grazing out paddocks and preventing any damage, with drier paddocks being targeted for grazing, where possible.

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