Farmer Writes: 2024 over and out

It’s hard to believe we're at the end of another year! They just seem to get faster and faster with every one that passes.

Every time I sit down to write my end of year review, it feels like the weather becomes the dominant topic.

This is mostly because of how bad it has been for farming over the previous 12 months and, unfortunately, this year has been no different.

There were some good spells along the way, but I don’t think anyone can deny that the summer of 2024 was just horrible, whether you were a farmer or not.

I was just looking over my 2023 review before I started this article and the last line read: “Anyway, the year is over and we move on into 2024 with hopeful anticipation of a better one, let’s face it, it can’t be much worse!”

That line proved not to be true, as, weather wise, 2024 probably was worse than 2023.

A year without sucklers

Anyway, enough of the negativity - we may not have experienced the long hot summer that we always hope for, but there were plenty of positives.

For me personally, it was my first year without suckler cows. The last of my cows were killed in January and there definitely was a lump in my throat as I put the last load on to the trailer and headed to the factory.

Getting out of sucklers was not a decision that was made quickly or lightly, but now that I’m a year down the road, I’m glad to be able to say it was the right decision for me at this time.

Once the cows were gone, attentions turned to buying in cattle to replace them.

I decided to buy mainly strong continental heifers with the hope that some would be finished off grass and allow for some cashflow in the back end of the year.

Just for comparison purposes, I bought a small number of bullocks as well, mainly continental, but of varying quality.

Most of my store lambs were gone by early March and thankfully the price was good.

Protected urea

The whole farm was then covered with slurry and, like many, attentions turned to getting soil results back so that I could figure out how much fertiliser I could apply.

The first year of the fertiliser register meant that no one, including myself, wanted to be spreading more than they were allowed for fear of incurring a penalty.

Because of this, I used protected urea for the first time and I must say I was happy with the results.

Contract grazing

Along with my new beef enterprise, I also started contract grazing heifers for a local dairy farmer.

Again, something completely new, but something that provided welcome cashflow through the summer months.

The plan was to get the heifers on to the farm as soon as grazing conditions allowed.

Unfortunately, due to another late spring, in was mid-April before my own cattle were at grass and early May before the dairy heifers arrived.

Grazing continued fairly unhindered through the month of May, the first cut of silage was taken on 9 May in ideal conditions and a grass surplus towards the end of the month even meant that some extra bales were made. Things were shaping up nicely.

Wet weather

Unfortunately, the onset of June marked the end of the plain sailing and due to wet and cold conditions, I ended up with 40 cattle in the shed for three weeks.

By the time June was over, most of the surplus bales that were made at the end of May had been fed.

July wasn’t an awful lot better, but at least at this stage I had built up a bit of grass due to some of the cattle being housed, which was able to carry me through.

Having enough of silage made after second cut, I decided to try grazing cattle on my red clover swards for the first time.

Something I was a little nervous of was the possibility of bloating the cattle and for potentially damaging the clover sward.

But, thankfully, due to grazing low covers and trying to stick to dry weather where possible, it worked out really well and the heifers achieved excellent performance.

I’d been feeding a small amount of meal to the heaviest heifers from mid-July and due to the never-ending inclement weather, I took the decision to house this batch in mid-August.

By mid-September, all my own cattle were housed, as they were all earmarked for finishing and also to try to allow me to graze the dairy heifers for as long as possible.

By mid-October, I had sent the dairy heifers home, as I wanted to make sure I had enough grass for the store lambs, which at this stage had been bought in.

Back end of the year

But I needn’t have panicked, as nature once again showed who was boss and provided us with one of the best back ends that I can ever remember.

It definitely felt like there was more grass grown in October and November than there was in June.

The first batch of heifers were killed at the end of October after two months of intensive feeding and performed exceptionally well.

The last two months of the year were occupied with the routine of feeding cattle and lambs - there was also a handful of lambs killed.

The daily routine was punctuated only with the dreaded herd test at the end of November and a slight bit of storm damage courtesy of storm Darragh in December.

As tradition dictates, the lambs have been weighed and batched accordingly between Christmas and new year.

I’m expecting a reasonable amount of them to come ready in January.

I like to hit 50kg to 51kg liveweight before lambs are killed and there are quite a few lambs around the 46kg to 48kg mark at the moment.

2025

Looking forward, January will hopefully see the next batch of heifers ready for slaughter and then the anticipation of the spring and the start of another cycle.

As I said this time last year, the year is over and we move on into 2025 with hopeful anticipation of a better one, weather-wise anyway.

But as we all know at this stage, hope is all we can do! Thankfully, there’s more to life than weather!

Happy new year everyone.