A crowd of over 350 people attended Tuesday’s Teagasc/Irish Farmers Journal BETTER Farm Beef Challenge walk which took place on Brian Doran's farm just outside Carnew in Co Wicklow.

Brian is farming 43ha of grassland and 41ha of tillage. The grassland area is split into two blocks. The 32ha main block is situated around the yard, with the remaining 11ha five miles away.

Simplicity is at the core of Brian’s system, with 50 suckler cows and calves running in one block and 55 steers and heifers running in another. All progeny are sold as steer and heifer beef.

The farm is no different to many farms across the country and is feeding both silage and concentrates in an effort to prolong the rotation and save what grass covers are left.

A crowd of over 350 people attended Tuesday’s Teagasc/ Irish Farmers Journal BETTER Farm Beef Challenge walk. \ Roger Jones

The agenda

At the first stand, programme manager Alan Dillon, Brian’s BETTER farm adviser Tommy Cox and Brian’s Teagasc B&T adviser Eoin Woulfe introduced the farm, its system and what Brian hopes to achieve on the farm throughout the course of the programme.

The next stand involved a discussion on herd health with Peter Lawrence from Teagasc and then an outline of the breeding system on the farm by BETTER farm adviser, John Greaney.

Hugh Mahon and Bob Sherriff of Teagasc gave a presentation on the key factors of grassland and soils management, before Irish Farmers Journal beef editor Adam Woods questioned Denis Brennan of Slaney Foods on the current and future market trends within the beef sector.

The walk ended with a discussion on drought and building fodder reserves by Irish Farmers Journal beef specialist Matthew Halpin and Teagasc head of drystock Pearse Kelly.

Each of the stands generated a good discussion between the audience and the speakers. For a summary of each of the main stands, watch the video below.

In tweets:

Crowd gathering now as the first BETTER Farm walk is about to kick-off in Brian Doran’s in Wicklow. Breeding, herd health, fodder and grassland management on the adgenda for the day #BETTERFarm @FJBeef @teagasc pic.twitter.com/hTgRFbN71m
— FJ Beef (@FJBeef) July 17, 2018

“Going forward, Brian’s farm is capable of producing a gross margin of €1210/ha, a rise of almost €400/ha in 5 years” according to Brian’s #BETTERFarm advisor Tommy Cox @FJBeef @teagasc pic.twitter.com/zR7Ux4yq7c
— Matthew Halpin (@MatthewHalpin22) July 17, 2018

“Ideally a cow should be weaning a calf at 42% of her own body weight - with a milky herd Brian is achieving a weaning efficiency of 44%” says @JohnGreaney5 of @teagasc #BETTERFarm @FJBeef pic.twitter.com/82TkC438Nu
— Matthew Halpin (@MatthewHalpin22) July 17, 2018

1000 fodder budgets completed a few weeks ago by Teagasc found that farms 20% short of fodder. This was a few weeks ago and factored in second cut. Likely a lot less fodder in yards today. Need very high growth in Aug to build covers and take out surpluses- Pearse Kelly @FJBeef pic.twitter.com/hnbWJ9efVu
— Adam Woods (@ajwwoods) July 17, 2018