Sheep finalists in Grassland Farmer of the Year

Johnstown, Co Kilkenny

Brian is one of two finalists in the sheep category of the Grassland Farmer of the Year competition. With a large flock of between 1,000 and 1,200 ewes, he is a busy man. On the day the judges visited in early September, Brian had more than 2,500 sheep on the farm, along with 60 dairy heifers which he contract rears for the summer.

The farm is large, with 122ha in one block, split by a road. The breed of sheep is a Belclare Texel cross, but Brian is dabbling in Easy Care ewes that don’t need to be sheared. The farm is an impressive place and Brian has invested heavily in making it labour-efficient.

One of the main ways he does this is by getting ewes to grass early in spring as this reduces the workload. Lambing was also delayed to the start of March and usually finishes about 15 April. Making sure there is grass on the farm in March is key for Brian.

On average, the farm grows 14t/ha of grass. Brian soil samples one-third of the farm every year and acts on the results. Three-quarters of the farm is over 6.2 for pH, two-thirds of the farm is at index 3 and 4 for phosphorus and potash. Basically, just one-third of the farm is below optimum for soil fertility. To improve soil fertility, he spread a lot more 18:6:12 instead of just straight CAN. If fields are low in potash, he spreads Classic N:K or 10:10:20.

The next focus is on reseeding. A high proportion of the Nicholson farm has been reseeded over the years, with 10% done annually. Since he has started to focus on soil fertility and grass, the farm stocking rate has more than doubled since 2011.

In terms of management, Brian splits the flock into four groups until June with about 300 ewes in each group. Between 5% and 10% of the lambs are drafted before weaning. After weaning, the lambs get the best grass and the heifers and ewes clean up after them. During the summer, the trigger to take out surplus grass for bales is if the sheep are getting seven or eight days in a paddock or if the days ahead on Pasturebase are at 12 to 14 days. There are 38 paddocks on the farm.

The replacement rate, including mortality, is 23% per year. Brian uses EID tagging for management purposes. He weighs lambs at birth and weighs them again at seven weeks of age, which will tell him which ewes have a lot of milk.

Brian thinks the farm has the capability to grow 3t/ha-4t/ha more than it currently is. To do this, he will keep improving soil fertility and reseeding. He says he typically works from around 8.30am to 5pm and just does herding at the weekend. Extra help is brought in during lambing and for big jobs.

Killarney, Co Kerry

Tomas is farming in two locations – the home farm of 45 acres at Rathmore and the outfarm of 75 acres near Fossa, outside Killarney, Co Kerry. Tomas is a beef and sheep farmer. He normally buys 60 store Friesian cattle at 450kg and finishes them off grass. The cattle are split into three groups and grazed with the sheep. All the stock are kept at Fossa for the summer, with the home farm, which has much heavier ground, cut for silage. All the ewes are lambed at the home farm and brought back to Fossa with their lambs.

Tomas has 320 Belclare and Suffolk ewes and the farm is stocked at 12 ewes/ha, which is a high stocking rate. There are 18 paddocks on the farm, so there are six paddocks per group of stock. Each paddock is serviced by a roadway and fenced and watered. The Kerry mountains are in the distance and Tomas is an active member of the Kerry Lamb producer group. Lambing starts on 1 March with the ewe lambs start lambing two weeks later. The farm is about 150ft above sea level.

Last year, the farm grew 13.5t/ha. Tomas reseeds about 6 to 10 acres every year, picking varieties from the top of the PPI list. He has clover in most of the swards. The fertiliser policy involves urea in early spring and a mix of CAN, Pasturesward and Superphosphate depending on the soil fertility and time of year. He spread 80t of lime over the past two years. Five years ago, 80% of the farm was at index 1 for soil fertility. Now that figure is down to 50% which is a big improvement but Tomas still has work to do.

When it comes to managing grass, Tomas walks the farm weekly using the Grasshopper plate meter. When growth is greater than demand he knows a surplus is coming. The trigger to take out a paddock is when the average farm cover is greater than 800kg/ha.

When the judges visited in late August, Tomas was apprehensive about the impact of Brexit on the beef industry and wasn’t yet sure if he was going to buy cattle this autumn. Different options were available to him including contract-rearing dairy heifers and selling surplus silage.