Soil moisture deficit levels are down below 30mm for most of the country, meaning it is no longer a limiting factor for grass growth.

Growth rates of over a 100kg/day were recorded in most counties this past week, with the average for the country being 85kg/day. At these growth rates, walking the farm every five days is a necessity.

These high growth rates are also creating a good opportunity for farmers to correct grass quality. Once a surplus of grass is identified, it should be taken out straight away to get the paddock back in the rotation as soon as possible.

Fertiliser

Fertiliser should now be continuing as normal. Where surplus bales are being taken off paddocks over the coming weeks, it is important to replace the P and K going with compound fertilisers such as 18.6.12 or slurry afterwards. Every 1 t/ha of DM that is baled removes 2.5kg more P and 25kg more K than if the same grass were grazed.

Required nitrogen level for grass only paddocks should be around 20 units/ac for the rotation. However, as we come into July you will now see an increase in the percentage of clover in your grass clover swards and it’s important to note that if the sward clover content makes up 20% or more of the sward that a reduced nitrogen application rate is used.

Normally the requirement is half, so 10 units/ac would suffice for a rotation.

As nitrogen application rates increase, the amount of N fixation generally declines. It’s important to take full advantage of the high clover content in these swards from both a financial and environmental point of view.

Nitrogen use efficiency is becoming very important in grazing systems and the sustainability of Irish farms.

James Beresford

Dungarvan, Co Waterford

Grass growth has taken off here over the last week so we have taken the opportunity to correct grass quality with four paddocks being taken out this week. We are currently grazing a paddock of 1,000 kg/ha cover, we targeted grazing it at lower cover as the grass quality was poor and we couldn’t afford to take it out. Pre-grazing yields to follow are around 1,300kg and of much better quality. This should help bring the milk tank back up which did take a hit over the last week. We are following the cows with 20 units/ac of Sulphur CAN and any paddock that is cut for surplus bales is getting two bags of 18.6.12 to help replace the P and K offtakes.

Donal Hickey

Kildavin, Co Carlow

We are still missing a lot of the rain here in Carlow but have got 40mm over the last week and the place in greening up well. We spread 2,500gals of slurry on the low covers on the grazing block with a dribble bar prior to the rain which should get growth going again. Pre-grazing yields are still a little light at 1,200 to 1,300kg/ha but with very good quality. We have 10 weeks breeding done. Breeding has gone well here with 89% served in three weeks and 100% after six weeks with a non-return rate of 74%.

Caroline O’Sullivan

Teagasc Curtins Farm, Co Cork

There’s plenty of grass here. Cow numbers have been reduced to 105 and another 30 acres were sprayed off last Friday for reseeding. The April/May reseeds are all back in the rotation and have been grazed once and we plan to graze them at 1,000kg/ha cover for the rest of the year to make sure clover has a chance to establish properly. We are following the cows with 20units/ac of protected urea on the grass only sward and 10units/ac on the grass clover and multi species swards. We plan on breeding here for another two weeks. There are 75 scanned in-calf out of the 105 to date with 15 more being scanned this week.