The summer of 2015 has been very different for farmers east and west of the Shannon. Over the past few weeks, farmers in the west have been under pressure, unable to cut silage due to receiving double if not treble the volume of normal rainfall. This is in contrast to the situation in the south and east.

With the uptake in weather conditions up to Wednesday, there has been an increase of farm machinery activity in the west. A number of farmers are only working through first-cut silage, with a second cut unlikely for some.

Contractor Des Hunt from Tulsk, Co Roscommon, said the weather has put contractors in his area “under severe pressure” with a backlog of work building up, which then has to be completed as soon as fine weather appears.

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Hunt said: “Work keeps building up, which means our team is working long hours to try and cope. The quality of the silage couldn’t be good; it’s late-cut and it’s received a lot of rain.”

Hunt added that the poor weather has seen demand for slurry spreading and reseeding building up.

Silage contractors in the east report less pressure; third cuts of silage are being made at a steadier pace with quality remaining high.

On the tillage front, the harvest is progressing well along the east and southeast. Tillage farmer Art Murphy from Enniscorthy, Co Wexford, is delighted with how the harvest is progressing on the east coast.

“With all corn now in from the fields and a quarter of the spring crops cut, yields are looking extremely promising as they continue to mount,” Murphy said.

However, he is concerned as a malting barley supplier to Boortmalt. This week’s high temperatures, along with sporadic showers of rain, “may jeopardise malt barley passing germination tests in the coming week”.

Slower pace in Donegal

The harvest continues to progress in areas like Donegal at a slower pace, with plenty of stop-starting reported.

Jim Deveney, from Donegal, describes this year’s harvest as “a struggle”, with the county catching heavy showers coming in off the north Atlantic, which continues to drag out the harvest.

“Winter barley is now finished up for the year, with the beginning of the wheat and oilseed rape harvest this week. Spring barley is a good few weeks away, as it is still very green at the moment.

“Yields are extremely high this year with the 10t/ha mark being broken in some areas.

“Quality is also excellent so far, if only the weather would permit us to get it done,” Deveney added.