Urea is going out on the grazing parcel with the heaviest covers getting 23 units an acre. The lighter covers will be grazed first to get animals accustomed with grazing again.

I will follow then with CAN (27%) at one bag per acre in these paddocks. This is a change for us this year as we usually graze and then follow with fertilizer, but with increased stocking rate this year at 2.4 lu/ha on the whole farm and a planned 15-20 % of farm to reseed, I want grass growing from day one.

I purchased a small amount of Urea back at beginning of January at €385 a tonne and I note with interest that it is costing approximately €440 per tonne today. CAN 27% followed a similar trend costing €280 per tonne in December and rising sharply in January and February. I feel as a farmer we are missing out on this by not being organised and taking advantage of this trend.

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Tillage farmers are probably the most proficient at this further purchasing, but as beef farmers we didn’t feel the need to, because of our small usage of the product. If it is the case that there is €50 a tonne saving to be made, we will definitely forward purchase in future. We can’t control the beef price we receive, but we can control costs inside the farm gate.

I planned on moving some cattle out to grass last weekend, but with heavy rain forecasted I postponed this for a couple days. The plan this week is to move some cattle out. Lambing is due to commence in about 10 days time, so it’s always an advantage to have some cattle out to grass so all the attention can be focused on lambing.