Although rainfall has been sporadic, those lucky farms, where heavy showers have arrived over the weekend and growth had not already dropped too singifiantly, can expect normal August growth rates to return quickly. Adequate grass supplies will meet the requirements of these herds over the coming weeks.
Continuing to apply chemical fertiliser and maintaining farm cover per cow at 170kg DM will keep farm management simple for the next few weeks on these farms, with low levels of supplementary feed required.
For the majority of the country, however, with soil moisture deficits of in excess of 75mm and little or no rainfall this week, growth is expected to be closer to the 20kg DM/ha mark for the week ahead. Farms should take action to reduce their demand to match growth and maintain a 25-day rotation length.
If pre-grazing covers greater than 1,000kg DM are still on farms, they should be grazed off before introducing a lot of extra feed. These covers are going backwards in the current conditions and their quality is also declining sharply.
On many farms, average farm cover is now close to 400kg/ha (and below 150kg/cow) and pre-grazing covers are below 900kg DM/ha.
These herds will require up to 50% of the diet to be supplied by high-quality silage and a mixture of parlour ration and straights. This will help to stretch grass and maintain animal performance until more growth resumes. To reduce demand, high cell count or chronically lame cows should be sold or removed from the milking platform as soon as possible.
This will free up space and feed for the rest of the herd. If bulls haven’t already been removed, that should also happen now.
The dry matter content of swards is really high in the current conditions (often in excess of 25%), so there is usually more grass in every paddock than expected.
Using strip wires to allocate grass accurately and ensure good clean-outs is important.
Any residual material left behind will decompose when normal conditions resume. Any higher residuals left behind will only delay healthy regrowths.
Shane Chambers – Bandon, Co Cork
Pre-grazing yields dropped below 900kg dry matter this week, but quality is good and newer grass clover swards are greener than the rest of the farm. We are feeding 5kg of silage before morning and afternoon milkings using the batt latch. We have been feeding a 10% crude protein ration until now, but will move on to a 14% ration this week. We’re holding rotation at 25 days for now.
We stopped spreading fertiliser three weeks ago and finished our 11 weeks of AI last week. We were going to reseed some of the outside silage ground, but will leave it now for another year and zero-graze that feed from there back to the herd during the autumn instead.
Stocking rate (LU/ha) 2.9
Growth (kg/ha) 21
Average farm cover (kg/ha) 345
Yield (l/cow) 19.0
Fat (%) 4.77
Protein (%) 3.94
Milk solids (kg/cow) 1.7
Concentrates (kg/cow) 5
Joe Dunphy – Easkey, Co Sligo
Growth was excellent up to last week, but dropped to 35kg this week. Pre-grazing yields are 1,100kg and we’re on a 25-day rotation. Regrowth on grazed paddocks is very slow. We’re feeding 3kg of concentrate in the parlour and a 3kg mix of silage and straights before milking.
The farm is still green, and we got 20ml of rain in the last three days. With no fertiliser spread in three weeks, we’ll go with 23 units of urea now. I expect a bounce in growth on greener parts of the farm, and we will pull silage out at the weekend.
We reseeded one paddock on the platform and another on an outblock this week. We have 11 weeks of breeding complete now.
Stocking rate (LU/ha) 3.3
Growth (kg/ha) 39
Average farm cover (kg/ha) 593
Yield (l/cow) 19.8
Fat (%) 4.64
Protein (%) 3.86
Milk solids (kg/cow) 1.9
Concentrates (kg/cow) 3
GD Young – Mullingar, Co Westmeath
Grass is starting to get tight here. Some of the paddocks that were due to be grazed are burning up and going backwards since the weekend.
Grass quality is average, helped by new reseeds that are back in the grazing round. Demand is 44kg, but there is little or no regrowth on paddocks being grazed and we are reducing cover every day with no rain.
We are feeding 4kg of straights before milkings using the batt latch and we will introduce some silage later this week when pre-grazing covers drop to 900kg DM/ha. We did a blanket spread of fertiliser at the start of July and we haven’t applied anything since.
Stocking rate (LU/ha) 2.96
Growth (kg/ha) 33
Average farm cover (kg/ha) 524
Yield (l/cow) 20.5
Fat (%) 4.80
Protein (%) 3.83
Milk solids (kg/cow) 1.8
Concentrates (kg/cow) 3
Mark Maxwell – Ballinagore, Co Westmeath
We are feeding silage to suckler cows now since the weekend, with growth virtually non-existent. Any rain we have gotten has only been in the form of mist, which hasn’t even kept the dust down.
I have some paddocks with a cover on them, but I am holding these off for when growth does come so I have ground to go back on.
Finishing cattle are receiving silage and high maize concentrates for the last three weeks, with the first draft of these gone today (Wednesday). We will draft fortnightly from now on.
Silage ground is probably a fortnight off cutting. I had intended to bale some of the heaviest as it is doing little to no growth, but nitrate levels in it are too high.
No fertiliser has been spread of late and I will await for decent rainfall before spreading.
System suckler/dairy calf to beef
Soil type variable
Farm cover (kg/DM/ha) 520
Growth (kg/DM/ha/day) 15
Demand (kg/DM/ha/day) 30
William Treacy – Hackballscross, Co Louth
We are taking it one day at a time in managing grass. All bar one group of suckler cows are on supplementation, with all others receiving either silage, hay or straw, or concentrates at grass. There are a group of bulls housed a month ago that remain inside, while autumn 2025-born bulls have seen their concentrate levels increased.
I am strip grazing covers, allocating half of what I normally would for a period and supplementing with forage.
Higher ground, in particular, is looking very poor, with covers wilting away in front of us. Happily, cattle are very content and easily fed.
Slurry is being mixed today (Wednesday) in the hope of some rainfall this evening. Second cut has been done and it’s unlikely I will manage a third cut with current growth, though we could see compensatory growth yet.
System suckler/dairy calf to beef
Soil type variable
Farm cover (kg/DM/ha) 380
Growth (kg/DM/ha/day) 20
Demand (kg/DM/ha/day) 37
Niall O’Meara – Killimor, Co Galway
I reintroduced four paddocks that I had taken out for long-term silage back in the grazing rotation as the middle of the grass wedge was looking very empty. We spread 2,000 gallons/acre of watery slurry across 10 paddocks on Monday through injection. This is now all the slurry out for the year, with just 40 bales of silage left to be made. I am confident that we will get growth to get this cut between now and the beginning of September. Second cut was taken a number of weeks ago at four bales/acre so this should make excellent-quality silage.
Heifer weanlings were recently weighed. They have an average daily gain of 1.1kg/day since weaning, with an average age of 319 days and an average weight of 405kg which I am happy with. The last bull weanlings will be sold towards the middle of August.
System suckler to weanling/ beef
Soil type variable
Farm cover (kg/DM/ha) 788
Growth (kg/DM/ha/day) 28
Demand (kg/DM/ha/day) 34
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