Watch and listen: sucklers draw Cathal back from Sydney

In 2015, Peter Breen had a decision to make. Balancing his duties as a town councillor in Gorey with running a 50-cow suckler-to-beef farm was becoming too much. Although he had been involved in the family farm for over 50 years, assuming control prematurely in his early twenties after the untimely death of his father, something had to give.

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the world, his son Cathal was facing a decision too. Having completed his leaving cert in 2007, obtaining his Green Cert and working a couple of jobs in Wexford town, Cathal had set sail for Australia in 2013.

“The books weren’t really for me. I worked at Wexford racecourse for a couple of years after college and then with a company manufacturing water systems in the town. I had some involvement in the farm, but it was more just to offer dad a hand when he needed it.

“Then the possibility of Australia arose. I decided that if I didn’t go then, I would never go. I spent almost two years there and while it was a serious experience, in early 2015 the group of people I was with out there were beginning to break up and return home. I was considering my options, when dad floated the idea of me taking the reigns at home,” Cathal said.

“He said he was considering leasing the farm out but that, if I wanted, I could make a go of it,” Cathal told me.

Cathal returned home from Australia in the summer of 2015, took up a job with Danone in Wexford town and started to assume control, plunging himself into the day-to-day running of the farm.

“While dad was looking to take a step back from the running of the farm, obviously he was vital in getting me up and going and still is. His experience has been invaluable and every day with him on the farm is a school day for me,” Cathal said.

Cathal was keen to get the 180-acre farm organised and producing closer to its potential, but was unsure about where to start focusing his attention. The farm had a low stocking rate – in 2016, it carried just 1.33 LU/ha, generating a gross margin of €278/ha. This translated into a net loss before basic payments were taken into account.

Listen to "BETTER Farm: paddock grazing in Co Weford" on Spreaker.

“In mid-2016, our Teagasc adviser Martina Harrington told us that the BETTER farm beef programme was starting its third phase and that she was keen to nominate us. She felt it would give us the motivation and direction that we needed. Here we are over a year later and things are going great,” Cathal said.

The farm is currently carrying 50 Limousin-type suckler cows, which calve in the springtime. The plan is to push this to 60 cows and slaughter all progeny. Steers will go at 24 months and heifers slightly earlier. The pair feel that 60 cows is the maximum they can manage, given their off-farm commitments. However, with the size of the holding, there is undoubted scope to put more legs on the ground. A dairy beef enterprise will fill this void.

“We’re planning on taking in 80 dairy calves per year – 40 in the spring and 40 in autumn. These will run in a steer beef system and because we have a lot of land in grass, some of these calves might get three seasons at grass. For example, the spring calves might go back to grass after their second winter and finish in June or July, when beef price is good. However, though we have plenty of room now we will need to consider putting up a shed in the coming years.”

This year’s calves are a mixture of early-maturing (Hereford/Angus) and Holstein genetics. On 26 June, they weighed 117kg and had achieved 0.71kg of daily weight gain from birth. They came from a cousin’s farm and Cathal paid €200 and €120 for early-maturing and Holstein-Friesian bulls respectively. There are a number of early-maturing heifers in the group and these cost €160.

“The calves were great to work with this spring. We took in 29 and I was able to fabricate a mixing device using a cordless drill and one of the blades from my mother’s kitchen blender. We split them up in three groups in the yard and fed them simply with one 10-teat drinker hung over the pen gates. In truth, we could have carried a lot more but this year was about dipping our toes,” Cathal told me.

The summer of 2017 has been an eye-opener for the Breens from a grassland point of view.

“There were around 15 divisions on the farm before this year,” Cathal said. “Field areas ranged from seven to 20 acres and you were moving cattle very infrequently. Martina (adviser) had dropped major hints about the necessity for paddocks even prior to the BETTER beef programme and the team put the shake on us to get them in. I have put up 7.5km of fencing this year and have another four to do. When we’re finished there’ll be 54 paddocks on the farm,” Cathal said.

“I measure the farm weekly and have been startled by both what we are growing and what we could potentially feed. Average cumulative growth so far this year is 6.5t DM/ha – but that ranges from 4.2t up as far as eight with the same fertiliser inputs. We have real peace of mind to get more numbers on the ground as the programme progresses,” he concluded.

Peter is equally happy with what the paddocking has done for the farm.

“The stock are much quieter now, I find. They’re being moved every two or three days and when they see you coming they come to the gap and almost move themselves – docility has improved greatly. As well as having more control over the grass, I feel we have more control over the cattle themselves now too. With the better sward quality and earlier turnout, I reckon we could be close to 100kg better off than last year with some of the animals,” Peter told me.