Cold weather of late had been affecting grass growth here on the farm but hopefully the rise in temperatures since the weekend, that came with the rain, will help to improve things. Last week there was a growth rate of 47kg DM/ha per day.

Hopefully the grass seeds that we set here last week won’t have been affected by the frost and the weather keeps to a more seasonal pattern. There is a demand of 40kg DM/ha/day here on the farm at present, but this is ever increasing as lambs start to consume more grass in their diet and I close ground up for silage.

This year I don’t plan to close up as much ground for silage as last, as I have a considerable amount of fodder left over.

Luckily the majority is in the form of hay which is safely stored away in the hay barn but there is a considerable amount of silage still around. Baled silage kept into the second year isn’t ideal for ewes as the risk of damage to bales is always present and sheep can be very delicate creatures at times.

Most of the surplus was due to the exceptional growth we experienced this time last year (75kg DM/ha/day for the same week). I will probably do some extra reseeding this year instead as there are a number of fields that aren’t as productive in the shoulders of the year as I’d like.

We recently weighed the first group of lambs born during the spring and I was quite disappointed with the daily liveweight gain. The gain was averaging approximately 285g per day but should be somewhere in the region of 300g plus.

I struggled to figure out what could have caused the loss of performance as the ewes had plenty of good-quality grass in front of them all spring. The only reason I can think of is that shortly after they went out, there was a prolonged spell of bad weather. I have spoken to some other farmers who were seeing similar patterns with their lambs too. The remaining groups are being weighed this week and I will be able to compare them. These seem to be performing well and hopefully this will show in the results on the scales.

Eye opener

I recently attended a meeting in one of the country’s largest sheep meat processing facilities and I must say it was a real eye opener to see the process involved in getting the raw product (our lamb) market-ready.

We were given a tour of the facilities from product development to on-site laboratory. We even got to sample some of the different products being produced. I was impressed to see the vast array of products being created – some for the Irish market and some for export. I hope to see a big drive in the supermarkets to sell these delicious products and increase the consumption of lamb.

It would be great to see more tastings in supermarkets – every customer loves to taste free samples and it might help persuade those who have a preconceived view of lamb to change their mind or to demonstrate how easy it can be to cook.

Sometimes one bad experience can turn some people off lamb –- often through over-cooking or a strong-tasting cut.

If the consumers were to sample what we were given on that visit to the factory I believe that the vast majority would be singing the praises of our Irish lamb.