Grass growth is beginning to tail off and along with wet conditions, grazing ground has become harder to manage.

Grass growth averaged 45kg DM/ha/day last week and swards analysed for feed value show that dry matter is down as low as 14%.

Crude protein is 21%, which is an improvement on previous weeks, with energy at 11Mj ME. As grass is so wet, cows are grazing through swards pretty fast and stores are not thriving like they were earlier in the year.

Swards are not being cleaned out properly either, as cattle are getting too unsettled on low covers and have to be moved to fresh grass sooner than I would like.

Hopefully, we will get another full rotation in this autumn, to clean off any rejected grass before closing off paddocks for the winter.

Stores

I have a group of 16 bullocks, mainly Angus-bred animals around 17 months of age. From turn-out in spring up to July, bullocks were gaining 1.2kg/day from grass.

However, since then weight gains have been poor, with the group struggling to better 0.3kg/day in wet conditions.

Bullocks are now getting 2kg/day of a 16% growing ration and will most likely be housed next week to improve weight gains, as well as protecting swards from poaching around troughs. The plan is to finish these animals out of the shed next spring.

There are also 13 store heifers that will be finished next spring. These animals are also at grass, although they are not getting meal at present.

Spring-born calves

The 2020 spring-born calves have been split into heifers and bulls. Bull calves are being encouraged to creep-graze ahead of the cows by raising the wire.

With calves creeping ahead of cows, they are getting the best grass possible. They are also being fed concentrates at a rate of 1kg/day in troughs ahead of the cows.

Hopefully, this boosts weight gain and gets bulls as heavy as possible before housing next month.

Bull calves and heifers have been separated. Bulls are eating 1kg/day of concentrates while heifers just on grass.

The Stabiliser bull calves will be intensively fed throughout winter, with the aim of finishing them around 14 to 15 months of age. The heaviest Angus bulls will most likely be finished as bulls also, with the lighter calves castrated and finished as steers next winter.

Calves will be weighed at housing and I will make the final decisions on what will be kept as bulls at this point.

Heifer calves

The heifer calves are not being fed concentrates just yet, but I will probably start feeding them once they are housed.

Concentrate feeding levels will depend on silage quality and housing weights. First-cut silage has been analysed and feed value is excellent, which will reduce the amount of concentrates needed.

Silage

Dry matter is 31.3%, energy is 12.18 Mj ME, protein is 15.17% and overall D-Value is 76.1%. Silage will be targeted to young bulls and, if reserves allow, the heifers selected as replacements and finishing stores.

Second-cut silage will be analysed shortly and targeted to the cows over winter. Feed quality should be good and will maintain body condition over winter.

Breeding season finished

The breeding season for the suckler herd finished up on 25 July, having started back on 15 May.

There were 72 cows running with Stabiliser and Angus stock bulls this summer and they will be scanned at housing. Empty cows will be weaned and fattened as early as possible.

I started off the breeding season with plans to serve 25 heifers to AI using the Stabiliser bull, Nobleman.

However, the remainder of the 2019-born heifers were weighed in early June and performance at grass exceeded expectations.

Based on liveweight at the time, I pulled out another nine heifers for breeding. These animals ran with the stock bull, which was used to sweep up repeats to AI.

Weight gains in store bullocks have dipped to 0.3kg/day due to wet grazing conditions. Concentrates are now being fed at 2kg/day and stores will be housed next week.

In total, there were 106 animals bred. Allowing for some empty cows and culls, we should be calving down between 90 and 100 head in the spring.

Preparations for weaning this year’s calves have started. Calves have received the first shot of a pneumonia vaccine and have also been wormed.

Calves are weaned using the QuietWean nose flaps. This will be my fourth year using the nose flaps and I find they work well, with calves coming off cows with little stress.

Once inserted in the nose, the flaps are left for at least a week. During this time, calves are allowed to stay with their mothers on grass.

As weaning is normally carried out in early October, cows are grazing low grass covers and grass quality is less of an issue, so cows are naturally starting to dry off.

Steady progress in bull beef performance

The 2019-born bulls were finished at an average age of 15 months, which is slightly older than the bulls killed during May and June last year.

However, carcase weights were significantly higher this year. Bulls averaged 407kg deadweight, up from 374.9kg in 2019 and 381kg in 2018.

This gives a daily lifetime carcase gain of 0.88kg/day for the bulls killed in June, which is up from 0.86kg/day last year and 0.84kg/day.

The higher performance of the bulls is coming from a combination of factors, mainly better herd genetics, weaning heavier calves and improved weight gains during the intensive feeding period.