Last Monday, 21 July, was IFA’s National Farm Safety Day. There have been many changes on our farm this year, with Colm coming home farming. So I decided to take the day very seriously. I invited the two men, father and son, individually, on a walk around the yard to discuss farm safety with them.

My reasoning was that they may be thinking differently and if I was talking to them separately it may throw up something we might not think of collectively. They both agreed readily because it is a priority on our farm. Tim suggested that I generate an “action list” from our deliberations.

It turned out to be a good exercise. There were a few things that both men identified immediately and will be fixed before the summer is out. They were already on their radar. There were items like easy access onto the roof of a shed and two unprotected banks. Both will cost a lot of money and time to rectify.

This is one of the obstacles to farm safety. It should be a budget item on farms so that it gets more attention.

Tim was practical in his approach and concentrated on safe work practices around a yard that he has worked for 14 years. It isn’t long since Colm was learning the theory, so his approach was totally different with regard to putting things in place for use in the event of an accident.

He mentioned eye goggles in the dairy for adding detergent at eye level and provision for washing eyes in the parlour in case of a splash into the eye. He also mentioned the lack of escape routes when handling livestock in two locations and saw trip hazards everywhere. In our own yards we are used to things that are always in the same place on the ground and we don’t see them as a hazard for someone else. There is always room for improvement and we can never put too much emphasis on farm safety.

Respect danger

Justin McCarthy, the editor of the Irish Farmers Journal, described last week how he nearly ended his little sister’s life. We’ve all been there and we’ve been lucky. I nearly got my daughter Julie killed because of parking her in a buggy near a gate that was holding cattle.

The gate flew open, tumbling down the buggy, but miraculously Julie escaped injury. Justin is right when he stresses the importance of giving children a healthy respect for the dangers involved in farming. Things we learn when we are young stay with us. My mother often told us of how her cousin was attacked by a bull.

The story went something like this: “My cousin Pat went in to feed the old bull every day. He was a huge red and white bull, very quiet and friendly. One day, out of the blue, the bull came at Pat and knocked him backwards. The bull knelt up on his chest. Imagine the weight of a big bull on poor Pat’s chest.”

That was enough to give me respect for bulls for life. That scene, described so well by my mother, is etched on my brain – the field, the gate, the trough and the bull kneeling on the man.

Diarmuid takes a risk

At the moment, there are three big, black Jersey X bulls that have recently begun their retirement in the field outside the house. A few weeks of good grass and they will be off to the factory. We only keep bulls for one year to reduce the risk of them getting cross.

This year, these three seem to be a bit more aggressive. Yet, when I look out the window they are lying down chewing the cud, the picture of docility. We are very conscious of bull safety when they are running with the cows. Diarmuid, who milks the cows regularly, is a concern.

He has an intellectual disability and so we do not ask him to bring in the cows from the field or bring them in out of the collecting yard. The points are hammered home every year “do not go in the collecting yard if the bull is there.”

Diarmuid knows this. One evening he had started milking and as Colm came into the parlour he saw Diarmuid heading into the collecting yard. Of course, he roared at him.

Diarmuid was a bit mesmerised as the bull was already gone through the parlour. A simple mistake as none of us had told him that there were two bulls with the cows.

Then another evening, Colm went over to find Diarmuid had separated the two bulls out from the cows in the passage before he put them into the collecting yard. The mind boggles. He was told not to go into the collecting yard so he solved the problem elsewhere.

These are just small examples of how risks are inadvertently taken on farms. None of us dreamt that Diarmuid would think the rule only applied to the collecting yard. Colm rang me to tell me

“Mom, you’ll never guess what Diarmuid has just done.”

A shiver went up my spine. We both had a good laugh at the irony of it, but it might well not have been a laughing matter. Generating an action list has been a worthwhile exercise for us.

It is about saving our own lives, the lives of the people we love and the lives of people who are loved by others. Take responsibility and farm safely.