I thought I might look like a complete fool. You see, my knowledge about grazing is suspect. I know that bullocks eat grass and that it makes them fat, but I know nothing about paddocks or grass wedges or rising plate meters or any of that technical stuff.

I needed to go on the internet and get up to speed on this sort of thing and quickly. Otherwise, I’d be the butt of dairy farmer jokes and, as a former president of the IFA has alluded to, my vast repertoire of knowledge on tillage matters could even be doubted. I might even lose this cushy number which I have with the Irish Farmers Journal.

You see, a few weeks ago, in a moment of madness, I had agreed to give a friend a bit of a dig-out. She had to make a promotional video for a certain brand of fertiliser, which is a big hit with dairy farmers.

Now, normally I don’t do promotional stuff, because most people know that any product endorsement by me might be seen as the kiss of death. And this could be a case in point. Here was Potterton spouting on about grass fertilisation and the crows picking at the dung pats would know more about it than him. It was a dairyman’s gig but they’re too busy.

I thought about ringing my knowledgeable colleague, Tommy Moyles, for a crash course. But even Tommy would be sound asleep – it was in the wee small hours when I came to this startling realisation – and I needed to be a serious grazing expert by 9am the following morning.

Internet

So I got up early and began perusing the internet for anything to do with high-tech grazing. Now, it kills me to say this but it was actually interesting reading.

After an hour of cramming, I had a basic grasp of the jargon and I’d probably be able to portray myself on the video as one of Ireland’s top grass farmers.

Eva and her film crew duly rocked up at 9am. But I was out before her and I’d already assessed a grazing field and confidently reckoned there was 2,500kg/DM/ha, give or take 100kg. Or, at least that’s what I’d tell them on the video. I’d sound like a real grass guru.

We chatted away and then Eva disappeared to her car and returned with a Farmworks rising plate meter. Well, I nearly had to run to the yard portaloo with excitement.

We, tillage farmers, delight in new electronic gadgets to play with. This electronic device makes grassland management quantifiable – it’s like a combine yield meter for grass. Eva did a nip around with the meter while we were tediously filming exciting footage like filling the spreader.

The result? My guess was close enough – the meter said 2,900kg/DM/ha. It would probably give Jack Kennedy a heart attack, as I’m greatly under-utilising the grass but I was amazed at myself. Since I’m all buzzed up, it’s not a problem – it’s either more stock or reduce the area – the latter is cheaper.

So, unbelievably, with the filming over, I was straight into Alfco for electric fencing supplies. I’ve split the grazing field in question to take ‘‘wraps’’ off the surplus.