How to reduce grass demand as shortages begin to bite

The majority of the calls Teagasc dairy adviser Pat Moylan is receiving at the moment are from farmers tight on grass, asking him what they are going to do for the next six to 10 weeks.

Pat covers the Kilkenny-Waterford area and said that for many farmers in the southeast, maintaining average farm cover and prolonging the grazing season for the next six to eight weeks is the target.

Farmers have to target a closing grass cover of 650kg to 750kg DM/ha, he told a recent Teagasc webinar, warning that a low closing grass cover could have huge implications for farmers next spring.

“Next year’s opening grass cover will be determined by what you close off at,” he said.

His advice to farmers was to complete grass and fodder budgets now.

Two farmers in Kilkenny outlined on the webinar the actions they have taken to reduce demand for grass and how much it is costing them.

Tom is milking 170 cows and has a stocking rate of 2.83/ha on the milking platform. He hasn’t started to feed any silage yet and cows are on a diet of grazed grass and soya hulls.

Tom noted that his farm is in a dry area with droughts most summers. He walks the farm every seven days and noticed in early July that growth rates were starting to drop.

He outlined that for the third week of September in 2023 grass growth stood at 72kg DM/ha/day. For the same week this year, that figure dropped to 30kg DM/ha.

“We knew we wouldn’t have a lot of silage for the winter. We have enough head space for each cow, so we started feeding soya hulls in July.

“They wouldn’t have stayed milking well enough on poor-quality silage.

“We started feeding 3kg [of soya hulls] to them outside and gave them 4kg/head [of concentrates] the whole summer in the parlour,” he said.

McEvoy normally closes off his farm at 800kg to 900kg DM/ha.

The ground conditions in the area allow him to turn cows out at the end of January, so he needs a good bank of grass come the spring.

Cows are currently milking 20l/day and are getting fresh grass. “We hadn’t the luxury of feeding silage this year. I bought the hulls for €200/t up until late.

“They were good value in July and August versus feeding silage at €40/bale.

“They get 3kg every morning and we’re milking once a day.”

Pat Moylan said that if Tom starts drying off cows on 11 November and starts to feed some silage, that average farm cover on 2 December will be at 754kg DM/ha, with cows in by night for the last two weeks of November.

When asked if he could offload animals to help reduce the demand for grass, he said he has TB on the farm and had to keep all calves on the milking block as well.

The extra supplementation of the soya hulls and ration is costing Tom €215/cow. Tom is paying €75/cow more to supplement cows compared to Michael Walsh as a result of his higher stocking rate and lower grass cover.

“If you have low covers and a high stocking rate and you want to target 750kg DM/ha [closing cover], your feed costs will be substantial over the next six to eight weeks,” Pat said. Tom recognises this and said “we know we’re tight [for silage]. We have to mind it and keep it out of the diet for as long as we can”.

Tom’s key advice

Michael is milking 140 cows, has a stocking rate of 2.5/ha this week and is feeding silage and ration.

He said that average farm cover ran down very low to 500kg DM/ha five weeks ago.

“We have a spring-calving herd with a huge emphasis on grass. We took action straight away,” he told a Teagasc webinar on Wednesday night last week.

“We extended the rotation length, upped supplementation and housed empty cows to reduce demand for grass.

“I walk the farm every five days. In mid-August I did four walks in a row and farm cover was falling. It got down to 503kg DM/ha and wasn’t looking like it was going to turn.”

Michael moved to start feeding silage and went up to feeding 2.5kg of ration for 10 days in the parlour.

“That wasn’t making a huge difference, so I went up to feeding 4kg of silage and 4kg of ration. Farm cover went up to between 600kg and 620kg DM/ha.

“I then decided to house 10% of the herd – empty cows – and started milking them once a day and giving them 5kg finishing nut.”

Currently, he’s feeding 4kg of ration, 3kg of pit silage and 11kg of grazed grass.

Walsh said he is restricted on feed space, so holds back the last 50 cows after milking to feed them silage to try and reduce overall herd demand for grass.

Of the 14 empty cows that are housed, he said that some of them are not doing huge yields on the finishing nut, but they will be more eligible for sale when the time does come.

He outlined that these cows are on silage, 2kg of ration in the parlour and on 5kg of a finishing nut in the evening.

Surplus silage

Walsh has surplus silage on hand for cows this winter and has labelled bales by the paddock they came off, yield and quality. This way, he knows that the better-quality silage is fed to the milking cows.

The cost of supplementing cows with the extra ration and silage is costing him €140 per cow up to now. See Table 4.

Teagasc adviser Pat Moylan outlined that the target average farm covver when closing off grass is 700kg to 750kg DM/ha.

“If Michael continues to feed silage for the next two weeks, his average farm cover will be at 780kg DM/ha on 3 December.

“If farm cover is low, there’s a danger that some grass could be burned off completely to leave a very low closing cover. This could have serious implications for next spring,” he said.

Michael’s advice