Frank & Des Beirne,

Newtownforbes Co Longford

Spring has been very busy here in Newtownforbes. Thankfully, I have only nine cows left to calve from the spring-calving herd. Overall, the calving season went well, with only two losses to date.

I let 15 autumn-calving cows with their calves out to graze the silage ground for four days in early March. Due to poor weather conditions, they were re-housed. When they were re-housed, I weaned the calves. The weanlings were turned out to grass again on 10 March and remained outside since then. There are 22 spring-calved cows out grazing full-time since 18 March. I turned another 15 cows and calves out earlier this week.

All the calves were vaccinated as a preventative for pneumonia. There have been very few problems, as a result. In previous years, there would have been a lot of pneumonia so vaccinating has proven to be a good option.

I plan to forward graze the yearling bulls and to keep them at grass until they are 485kg to 500kg. At this point, I will weigh up the market and decide whether to finish the bulls or sell live.

Wet weather in February made it difficult to get stock out early to graze off heavy covers so as to get slurry spread. I spread 3,000 gallons/acre of slurry with the umbilical system and dribble bar. There was minimal damage to ground and it places the slurry on the soil rather than coating the grass.

There are covers in excess of 1,600kg DM on some of the paddocks. On Monday, I spread half a bag of 10-10-20 and two bags of urea on the silage ground. Grass growth over the past week averaged 61kg Dm/ha/day.

Replacement heifers will be bred to AI before the cows. Cows were vaccinated with BVD and Lepto before turnout in preparation for the breeding season which is just around the corner.