Sowing multispecies and feeding crops for sustainability

The drilling did not start this year until April and the spring barley was only sown in May on Gareth’s farm. There will be a shortage of straw because it won’t bulk up and he expects that there will only be about 2.5t/ha of grain from the spring barley this year.

The crops are very small and the northeast wind is leaving the temperatures cold. This has led to the growth slowing down and it is not looking hopeful for a good yield.

The rotation on Gareth’s farm has been thrown off track this year. He is now limited to what can be sown after the harvest season.

Over the coming weeks, Gareth will be busy spraying with fungicide if needed, but the focus will be on feeding the crops with nutrition. The machines for harvest will be pulled out ready for the end of July.

Martin got his first-cut silage done early in June when the fine spell finally came.

He hopes to get some hay made later this summer for drying off the cows and has got slurry and protected urea out for the second-cut silage.

In March, he planted 500m of a hedge as part of ACRES. The hedge is growing well, he said, and just needs some maintenance. Some 250 trees were also planted to capture ammonia lost around the farmyard.

Over the coming weeks, he hopes to oversow with multispecies as the sward is gone low in plantain and chicory. Martin said that he did graze it to often and just didn’t manage it well.

The wet spring left Andrew Mulhare struggling to get his cows out to grass. Luckily, he had surplus silage and in April he was able to let them out.

Some of the slurry was spread on the silage fields in January and February to take the pressure off the tanks filling.

Andrew sowed malting barley and beans in April and feeding barley at the start of May; he also has a paddock ready to sow with multispecies beside his yard.

As part of ACRES, Andrew put in a crop of wild bird cover and has fenced off a wet area of his farm under the riparian buffer measure.

Weaning the calves and vaccinating the cows are jobs on Andrew’s list for the end of June.

Grass has been the biggest challenge these past few weeks. The lambs are not thriving as well as they should be with the poor weather conditions and lack of growth.

The fertiliser was spread in late May due to the land conditions being untraficable and first-cut haylage was done in June.

The 20 Tykillen hives produced a disappointing amount of honey in the spring harvest. Ciara is hoping for a better return in August.

A new 60x40m sand arena was added under the TAMS grant for training, as well as three new foals.

The mares are now back in foal and Ciara hopes to get embryo transfers from one mare that qualified for the Dublin Horse Show.

The grass growth is slow. Land was too heavy and wet in spring for slurry to go out. After the silage is cut, Kenneth plans to spread all his slurry. Lime will also be spread over the coming months across the areas of the farm that need it most.

The cattle were let out in small numbers early in March, as Kenneth was running low on silage and hoped the weather would get better.

A 400m whitethorn hedgerow was planted by Kenneth during the winter, as part of ACRES, which will provide great shelter for the cattle and it also promotes biodiversity on the farm.

This spring, Barry Powell (pictured) took on a project to plant a hedge as part of the Trees on the Land programme.

The fence was put up around the hedge to prevent the cows from damaging the plants.

Barry got 2,500g/ac of slurry out and Pro 18s Protected Urea with sulphur after the first-cut silage. Soil sample results are used to determine what fields need P and K from the slurry.

After missing the first round of fertiliser back in February when the ground was wet, he only spread in May.

Barry has noticed that the clover in his swards is struggling at the moment.

The wet spring and cooler than expected winds in June have left the clover slow to get going.

Tullamore Farm manager Shaun Diver says some of the light stock were put out in March. However, the majority of the cows were only let out in April.

Shaun is happy that the breeding season is going well. He has been using all AI this year.

Some of the early cows will be getting scanned soon and he hopes to see if any problem cows get picked up before the end of breeding season.

Silage was made on Tullamore Farm on the last day of May with 16ha closed for second cut. Slurry was applied along with 2.5 bags/ac of cut sward.

Shaun hopes to make some hay from the 5ha to have for the winter

Shaun has been kept busy footbathing all the sheep, weighing the lambs and getting Tullamore Farm ready for the open day on 23 July.

Pádraig wintered 40 continental store cattle this year. Twenty-four were finished out of the shed on 18 April.

The remaining 16 cattle didn’t go out to grass until 10 May.

The cattle will get meal at grass from mid-July and will be killed in September off grass. Ninety bales of hay and 180 bales of silage were made during the first week of June.

The silage ground got two bags of 24/2.5/10 on 18 June and the fields needing it most will get a mix of cattle and pig slurry next week.

The plan is to take two more higher-quality/lower-quantity cuts before the end of the season, one in late July and one in late September.