Time to cut back on meal as farm covers improve

Looking at the data from PastureBase, dairy farmers have an average cover per cow of 225kg DM/ha, so are well on target at this time of the year.

This will allow less meal to be fed – something farmers got very little chance to do this year after a wet spring followed by low growth rates in May, June and early July.

If farmers are growing well in excess of demand and are at risk of developing surplus grass, just the minimum amount of meal should be fed.

Any surplus grass on the platform will help with winter fodder, but it should be cut soon to get the field back into rotation before we start building covers for autumn.

Fertiliser

With the final date for fertiliser application being 14 September, farmers should plan out their next two rounds. Firstly, you should look at what fertiliser is available to spread and make a plan accordingly.

Some farmers missed a round of fertiliser due to the wet spring, so don’t forget to factor this in.

Also, farmers in derogation should not forget the extra 12kg N/ha, which is essentially another half a round that can be spread.

If you are tight on fodder, then the extra allowance would enable you to spread enough fertiliser for a third cut on 20% of your land area.

Where surplus bales are being taken off paddocks over the coming weeks, it is important to replace the P and K going in with compound fertiliser such as 18-6-12 or slurry afterwards.

Every 1 t/ha of DM that is baled, removes 3.2 units of P and 20 units of K.

John Russell – Manorcunningham, Co Donegal

Grass quality is very good. Cows are on 12 hour blocks, grazing covers between 1,300-1,400kg DM/ha with some aftergrass coming back into the round.

We did a good bit of pre-mowing over the last few rotations, but we would have preferred to take off surplus bales. However, with the growth being low it wasn’t possible.

Cows are being followed by a half bag of pasture sward per acre. We also spread 120 tonnes of lime on 50% of the farm last week.

Second cut silage was cut on 1 July and regrowth has been very good on it, so we plan on taking a third cut in about three week’s time.

Stocking Rate (cow/ha) 3.83

Growth Rate (kg/day) 81

Average Farm Cover (kg/cow) 217

Yield (l/cow) 24

Fat% 4.02

Protein% 3.70

Milk Solids (kg/cow) 1.91

Concentrates 4

Padraig McCarthy – Lixnaw, Co Kerry

We got 9ml of rain overnight about 10 days ago and it turned the farm around. Before that, growth hovered around the high 30s, with cover per cow dropping to around 120kg DM/LU. We had to go in with 6kg of meal to get by.

We’ve two thirds of our reseeds grazed, and there’s some second cut aftergrass coming back into the rotation.

There’s 25% of the platform that has good clover content. Normally we go zero chemical nitrogen, but from May this year we went with another round of 15 units of chemical nitrogen to help clover content. Only parlour washing is being spread on the clover paddocks now.

Stocking Rate (cow/ha) 3.2

Growth Rate (kg/day) 57

Average Farm Cover (kg/cow) 184

Yield (l/cow) 18.5

Fat% 4.68

Protein% 3.96

Milk Solids (kg/cow) 1.65

Concentrates 2

John Joe Collins – Teagasc Ballyhaise, Co Cavan

Growth has taken off here in the west. We took some surplus bales off the platform last week from the final few paddocks that needed grass quality corrected.

We are also in the process of baling up a third cut of red clover.

Clover has kicked into gear the last three weeks on our clover trials.

These clover paddocks haven’t received any form of nitrogen in the last two months. We front loaded them early on in the year with 125kg N/ha.

Bloat hasn’t been an issue so far, but with damp weather coming towards the weekend we will start to add bloat oil to the troughs.

Stocking Rate (cow/ha) 2.72

Growth Rate (kg/day) 80

Average Farm Cover (kg/cow) 213

Yield (l/cow) 19

Fat% 4.43

Protein% 3.58

Milk Solids (kg/cow) 1.57

Concentrates 3