The year 2015 will go down as a pretty decent one on grass farms, with rain arriving at the right time for the dry farms and not too much for the heavy farms so that it reduced growth rate.

October growth was exceptional and extended the grazing year for many up to very recently. Heavy November rains finished the grazing season on farms with heavy soils. April and May were slow and reduced the amount of grass grown in spring.

When you see totals upwards of 13 tonnes per hectare grown on medium to heavy soils, you know it has been a good year.

On dry farms, they achieved upwards of 15 tonnes on average. The focus for all will be to get those paddocks in single figures up into double figures.

Again, the growth rate has been exceptional this week and growth rates are well ahead of where they normally are at this time of the year.

The mild but very wet weather is keeping the October-grazed paddocks for next February moving along nicely and will deliver a very good cover for next February grazing.

Some farmers are telling me there is already a cover over 1,400kg and 1,500kg on some of the early October-grown paddocks.

You can melt condition off cows very quickly at this time of the year, especially with long walks on wet roadways.

Be very careful and you may be well advised to dry off cows if conditions are not ideal. Milking indoors on average-quality silage will also reduce condition score significantly.

Growth rates for the last week are still coming in between 20kg and 25kg per day on most farms, which is over twice the norm for this time of the year.

Steven Fitzgerald,

Curtins farm, Fermoy

Stocking rate 2.96

Growth rate 25

Average farm cover 802

Yield 13.5

Fat 5.91

Protein 4.34

Milk solids 1.4kg MS

Supplement 2kg meal

We finished grazing on Wednesday and we have finished with a much higher cover than I was talking about last week. Last week I predicted we’d close at 650kg but it is actually closer to 800kg. We have had a very good growth rate of 25kg per day for the last week and it’s showing on all the paddocks. Some paddocks already have 1,400kg and 1,500kg of a cover for next spring. We have 60% dried off and the plan is all will be dried for 5 December. Average tonnes grown came to 15.5 tonnes/ha, ranging from 11 tonnes to 19 tonnes per hectare. It was good solid year of growth with no massive peaks in growth.

Donal Patton

Teagasc Ballyhaise, Co Cavan

Stocking rate 2.9

Growth rate 20

Average farm cover 650

Yield 10.2

Fat 5.23

Protein 3.88

Milk solids 0.95

Supplement 3kg meal and silage

We have grown 13.8 tonnes on average for this year. That works out the same as an average year for us when we look back over the last four years. We got the cows out for a few days this week to clean up the last of the paddocks, but after Thursday, grazing will be all over for another year. We still have 75 milking inside and will dry 20 of them next week and the balance over the following two weeks. So, effectively, all will be dry within three weeks.

Ger Pardy

Offaly

Stocking rate 2.8

Growth Rate 19

Average Farm Cover 820

Yield 13.0

Fat 5.27

Protein 4.28

Milk Solids 1.28

Supplement 2 kg Meal

We had cows on a long walk so we have been feeding them 2kg of meal to bring them into the parlour. Total tonnes grown was 13.6 tonnes and this ranged from eight to 18 tonnes. In general, it was a good year. April and the first half of May were slow but back-end growth has made up for that. We had some heavy paddocks of grass that were grazed in October and November that now have a cover of 400kg, which would be unheard of on our farm during other years. We have 60% dried off and all will be dry next week, so we keep the condition on cows for next spring.

William Dennehy

KIllarney, Kerry

Stocking rate 2.9

Growth rate 15

Average farm cover 800

Yield 13

Fat 5.09

Protein 4.19

Milk solids 1.25

Supplement 2kg meal & bale silage

We are slightly behind on total tonnes grown compared to 2014, but it was still a very good year for us. We will end up very close to 16 tonnes grown on average. I must do my final cover in the next number of days to finalise that for 2015. Average farm cover will finish about 800kg, which leaves a good cover for the spring. We are about to dry off all cows because man and beast needs a rest at this stage.