My oh my, how things have turned very messy the last few days. You will be glad to hear it’s the ground conditions I am talking about and not the accounting procedures of the IFA.

A month ago we were confident of keeping cattle out well into November, grass was abundant and ground conditions perfect for optimal utilisation. Then down came the rain and sheep even had to be moved off wetter fields. All beef cattle are now housed, but the belties are still out.

Heifers are all sorted in batches according to weight. We use ICBF to weigh our cattle. Purchasing a weighing scales has been discussed but I am very happy with the ICBF service. Even with the charges, the information you get back via the website and written reports is fantastic in helping make plans for the cattle.

Firstly, the bought in weanlings this year did an exceptional thrive. The first weanlings were bought on 18 September, and buying finished on 19 October. They were purchased at weights from 350kg to 396kg LW. Weighing was carried out on 16 November. The lightest heifer was 383kg and the heaviest was 474kg.

Three separate groups are now housed:

  • A group at 550kg upwards on a finishing diet, ad-lib silage and 5kg of a 14% high-energy ration.
  • A group from 470-520kg, on ad-lib silage. We will wait until after Christmas to decide whether to finish indoors or return to grass in March.
  • The biggest group is from 383-470kg on ad-lib silage. These are all to be finished off grass next summer.

    This silage was tested and it was of average quality. It was a field of surplus grass taken out in August. PH was high at 5, DM 33, DMD 66 and protein 13%. We have not tested the May/June silage yet.

    On the sheep front, lambs are nearly all sold now. We have 37 ewes and wethers in one batch, 11 ram lambs in another and they are being fed. The ram lambs are stores; the others are mainly our own lambs from our ewe lambs which lambed in April. They will be fed for two more weeks and slaughtered then. This was our first year in a long time to keep stores and we are happy so far with performance and returns. One observation we have made is if buying stores again we will try and stick to wethers/rams. They have a better ability to carry more weight. Ewe lambs are fine but you need to buy them at €5/head less.

    Rams have been removed apart from three charollais rams with our own ewe lambs. They will get one more week and be removed then. Better finish up now as the scanner man is arriving after lunch to scan some ewes.