The last couple of weeks have been exceptional for the time of year, and ground conditions have improved significantly every day, to the extent that we are taking the opportunity to graze off some of the wetter areas of the farm before the rain inevitably returns again.

The pattern with climate change in recent years seems to be longer spells of both wet and dry weather instead of our traditional mix of a few fine days mixed with a few showers.

While we need to try to minimise climate change as much as possible, we probably also need to adjust to it a bit and be flexible with grazing and feeding plans throughout the year, with plenty of silage reserves at all times to get through the challenging periods.

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We could just as easily have had an exceptionally wet period through calving, with cows housed full time and a lot more silage eaten.

We might still get those conditions through March so we will take advantage of the current conditions and be ready to go back indoors with our tail between our legs if and when we need to.

For the moment it’s great to see some empty sheds and less dry cows in the remaining sheds every night.

Grazing

We grazed some lighter covers of grass when the cows went out to graze first and we are moving through some heavier covers this week. There is a real division on farm at the moment in terms of grass covers.

Any paddocks that were closed early in October and the first half of November have very heavy covers of grass and conversely, the paddocks that were grazed through the second half of November and into December are all very bare.

The wet weather in the autumn, followed by early hard frost, has really knocked these paddocks back over the winter.

We put a half bag of urea out on the whole farm this week to hopefully encourage a bit of growth and recovery, especially in these areas of the farm.

The paddocks that we grazed first through January are actually looking better than those grazed in December.

We have some slurry out as well and will go with more as paddocks are grazed. This should also help to kick start some of the paddocks that are struggling a bit.

The maiden heifers are out grazing this week and ideally they can stay out now for the spring.

They have grown well over their short winter confinement on silage and 2kg on concentrate and, all going to plan, they won’t see meal again now until they hit the parlour after calving.

Calving

Calving is progressing well too, with over 70% calved now and the first couple of batches of bull calves have left the yard already, with more planned to leave this week.

There is good enough demand for Friesian bull calves and exceptional demand for the beef calves that will start to arrive in bigger numbers from next week onwards.

We will also sell off some Friesian heifer calves over the next few weeks to keep the workload under control. Again, demand for these seems strong enough, so hopefully we can move them on quickly and concentrate on the ones that we are keeping for ourselves.

While the weather has been fine for the last couple of weeks in Clara, there has been a big cloud hanging over all of us as we go around our daily lives.

We lost a young farmer from our community in a tragic accident last week and it has knocked the wind out of all of us. James Nolan was a great farmer, a really talented hurler and was always in good humour with an infectious smile.

All of our thoughts and prayers are with his family at this time and will be for some time to come. Hopefully they can somehow find the strength to get through this very difficult time.