Harry Lalor farms full-time, alongside his father Joe on the family farm just outside Ballacolla in Co Laois. They are the county’s representatives in the Teagasc/Irish Farmers Journal BETTER farm beef challenge.

The land apportioned to the cattle enterprise is just over 82ha, with the rest allocated for sheep and tillage. Land type on the farm is predominantly free-draining. However, there are some heavier areas which the Lalors targeted for drainage and reclamation works in recent years.

On the livestock side of things, the system consists of a 115-cow, spring-calving suckler herd and a mid-season lambing flock of 225 ewes and 90 ewe-lambs.

All cattle on the farm are finished. What would have traditionally been a steer-beef farm has moved to a bull-beef farm since the programme began in 2017. Heifers are slaughtered from 20 to 24 months. In the spring of 2018, Harry also undertook the rearing of 55 dairy-cross calves. “Looking back, they were too expensive, which is going to leave it very difficult to make any sort of a margin on them,” Harry said. “My decision on whether or not to buy calves this year will be purely based on a reduction in price.”

2018

Given the free-draining nature of the farm, the summer of 2018 had a big impact on grass growth, and consequently on the overall financial performance for the year. Gross margin dropped to €797/ha, a €252/ha drop from 2017. As already highlighted, weather conditions played a big part in this, particularly through extra expenditure on feed. Total feed costs climbed €105/ha to €502/ha for the 12-month period. However, all is not negative. Despite the tough 2018 conditions, the farm posted a significant improvement in performance. Gross output jumped 20% to 1,075kg/ha, while the farm’s stocking rate is at an impressive 2.6LU/ha.

One significant contribution to making up feed deficits on the farm in 2018 was the success of forage crops. Thirteen acres of redstart and 14ac of rape provided feeding for more than 70 cattle for the entire winter. Strip wires were moved two yards twice daily, while a bale of silage was allocated once daily. Ground conditions and utilisation of the crop were exceptional.

Calving

Calving on the farm is going well. Up until last weekend, 15 out of 115 had calved. The Lalors prefer to calve the bulk of their cows in March and April, mainly due to facilities. “We would probably need a lot more facilities here on the farm if we were to calve earlier,” Harry said. “March is often a bad month weather-wise so leaving it closer to April gives us a better chance of getting newborn calves out quickly.” For the few calves that have already landed, Harry is pleased so far: “We changed to a higher-spec pre-calving mineral this year and I think it has made a huge difference. Calves are hitting the ground with much more vigour and very few have to be helped suck.”

So far, the only complication has been a C-section. In this instance, it wasn’t because of a large calf but rather the cow’s pins didn’t drop for calving. But the Lalors are determined to weed out these problem cases. “That cow will get a red tag in her ear which is a mark for culling. In the past we would have kept a cow like her and all of a sudden you’re in the same situation this time next year when she is trying to calve.” It is a very sensible strategy by Harry and Joe. The calving season is tough enough without running into problem cases when they could have been avoided.

Beef

With a large grazing platform, the Lalors have opted for a 20-month bull beef system for the past number of years in order to maximise weight gain from grass and achieve heavier carcase weights. However, getting out-of-spec bulls slaughtered in recent months has been difficult. With that, Harry and Joe will try to increase the proportion of under-16-month bulls leaving the farm.

At present, the 2018-born bulls picked for under 16-month finishing are on 3kg of ration, 5kg of beet and silage. While these are March/April born bulls and have time on their side, meal feeding will need to be increased to ensure sufficient fat covers are built up before slaughter. Elsewhere, 2017-born heifers are also being finished. They are receiving 5.5kg of a 15% CP ration, 20kg of beet and silage. The first draft of these heifers was made in mid-December and all should be gone by the end of March. Table 1 outlines the farm’s slaughter performance in 2018.

Adviser comment: John Greaney, Teagasc

Harry and Joe have really embraced the ethos of the BETTER farm programme since day one. Steady improvements have been made across grassland management and animal performance. The biggest issue for Harry is labour. The stocking rate on the holding has gradually increased and stands at 2.64lu/ha. The drought last summer did hinder progress but it also emphasised the need to have a fodder reserve in place for extreme weather events. Selling fancier heifers off grass live may be worth revisiting on this holding to cut feed costs and reduce the workload. A lot of money has been invested in fencing, land reclamation and soil fertility so the Lalors should see a lift in profitability over the next two years. Given the size of the holding a dairy calf-to-beef system has a key role to play alongside his main suckler herd, but calf prices need to drop to make any investment worthwhile.