Slaughtering in June

You should have selected the cattle intended for slaughter mid-summer. June has traditionally been a good month to slaughter cattle, with supply generally tight around that time of year and price at its highest.

This year looks to be the same, with prices edging slowly up in recent days and forecasts for further increases. Ideally, cattle for feeding should be grouped separately to allow meal feeding to commence in the coming weeks. Meal feeding should be targeted to be fed for six weeks pre-slaughter. While grass quality should be very high at this time of the year, some meal feeding at grass will help grades and kill-out percentage.

A simple mix of barley, maize meal, beet pulp or distillers will be more than sufficient, with ample protein coming from the grazed grass. Try and feed early in the morning to avoid animals waiting around troughs all day.

Weigh the cattle if you can and keep an eye on fat covers to avoid any penalties when slaughtering. Bulls born in February 2017 are coming close to the under 16 months age limit. Keep an eye on the ages to make sure you get them killed on the grid with the quality assurance payment.

Also, talk to your processor in advance of killing to let them know what’s coming on stream and to discuss your required price.

Grass

It’s been a feast or famine for the last few weeks. High growth rates in the last two weeks have meant some fields have got too strong for grazing. Tullamore farm recorded 109kg of growth over the past seven days, which has meant three paddocks have been earmarked for silage at the weekend.

Avoid the temptation to spread a bag of nitrogen on these fields to bulk them up and cut with your main cut of silage. You could be short of grass in two weeks’ time if too much was closed.

You are better off to take these paddocks out as bales in the next dry weather window. This will help maintain grazing quality and also mean you have some very high-quality bales of silage in the yard for next winter.

This grass is generally low in dry matter and needs a good wilt before baling. Remember, if taking out silage off paddocks you need to replace some P and K along with nitrogen to keep up soil fertility levels.

Stock bulls

Stock bulls should be fertility tested before going out with cows ahead of breeding. While it’s not a 100% guarantee that everything will go okay for the breeding season, it will alert you to any issues, eg low sperm count, abnormal sperm or infertility.

Many vets now carry out this service and there are also specialised operators providing a fertility testing service. Ask yourself if you have a back-up plan if a bull gets hurt on your farm.

Some farmers will purchase a young bull to have them stand in if another bull gets hurt.