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We have received a lot of queries about letting animals outside in the inclement weather, particularly from spring-calving suckler farmers. There is no issue with cattle and very cold conditions, provided they have shelter from wind and blizzards.
The younger the animal is, the more vital this access to shelter is as they have a greater relative surface area of their bodies exposed than mature cows. With this in mind, if pressure is coming on housing facilities, cows and stronger calves (>2/3 days old) can be let out to paddocks with shelter on the eastern side. If there isn’t any shelter, drop some round bales along a field boundary.
It is vital that we feed any animals outdoors well during the snowy period. All cattle need to have access to grass silage and I would be increasing meal feeding rates by 1-1.5kg to account for the increased maintenance requirement for energy – a 650kg cow needs to burn a lot more energy to keep her body temperature up in -5°C weather versus 5°C weather. Also, given the inevitable increase in stress levels, any meals going into cows are ideally high in magnesium. Keep magnesium lick buckets in the field too.
Where young calves are outdoors, check them regularly. If there are calf jackets available, put them on the younger calves. Common sense must prevail also – there is no point trying to keep cattle out for the sake of it. The rule book goes out the window in conditions like this. If getting cattle outdoors means that they are going to be a good distance away from the shed, then in places where blizzards are forecast in the near future is it really worthwhile? Young animals will fail in blizzard-like conditions and we need to think of our own wellbeing as well. We don’t need to be out chasing calves around paddocks when the blizzard starts.
In terms of water and frozen pipes, the danger is with finishing bulls. We need to keep the water in to these animals and in the short term we can do so at the expense of animals on silage-based diets.
Co Carlow
System: suckler to store/beef
Soil type: free-draining
Farm cover (kg DM/ha): 1391
Demand (kg DM/ha/day): 2
Growth (kg DM/ha/day): 2
With the very harsh weather over the past week, there has been little or no grass growth. Ground conditions have improved very well the last few weeks and this has allowed me to get 2,000 gallons of slurry per acre on low index paddocks. The remaining part of the farm got 23 units of nitrogen/acre in the form of urea on 8 February and to date it has made no impact on growth.
Cows are calving at present and thankfully it is going well. Cows are currently being supplemented with pre-calving minerals and two weeks before calving they are given around 1kg of soya bean meal to improve colostrum quality and quantity.
I turned out a group of steers last week and they seem fairly content out. The last of my 2016-born steers are in good condition and they will be slaughtered this week to free up space for calving. I have two groups of dairy calves being reared at present. This year I installed an automatic feeder for rearing them and it is working very well.
Co Kerry
System: suckler to weanling
Soil type: variable
Farm cover (kg DM/ha): 822
Demand (kg DM/ha/day): 3
Growth (kg DM/ha/day): 8
The last week of dry weather has greatly improved ground conditions. However, soil temperatures are still down at 2°C. I was feeding yearling bulls aimed for 20-month bull beef on 2kg of ration and good-quality silage over the winter until they went for grass last Thursday 22 February, freeing up much need space in sheds for calving cows. I will aim to have these yearlings on top-quality grass throughout the year to ensure a high average daily weight gain. It is hard to know what weather to expect.
I hope to be able to leave these animals out unless a large amount of snow falls. I will assess the weather on a daily basis and determine if there is a need to bring these animals in again for a few days. Slurry has been spread on an outside block of land to reduce pressures on storage at a rate of 2,500 gals/acre. I plan to spread the rest on grazed ground. I hope to cover the whole farm with 30 units/acre of urea as soon as possible.
Co Mayo
System: suckler to bull beef
Soil type: variable
Farm cover (kg DM/ha): 822
Demand (kg DM/ha/day): 3
Growth (kg DM/ha/day): 8
The weather is very cold but the much-needed drying is welcome and ground has dried out very well. Grass covers have regressed over the past two weeks as soil temperatures have still not lifted. I did go with urea last week and although it hasn’t kicked in yet it’ll stand to ground when temperatures do rise. I hope to get slurry out towards the weekend. I’m trying to get silage ground grazed off along with some of the heavier covers around the home block before I go with slurry. The lime I put out in the back end has greened every paddock up nicely. Fifteen bulls are grazing at home before they go to an out-block of ground but I’ll wait to see what the weather brings. I also have autumn-born calves grazing and I’m tempted to let the cows out with them if it stays dry. Although growth is minimal I have plenty of grass as I adhered to my autumn rotation planner and closed certain paddocks early. I’ve loads of fodder for what could now be a very late spring.
Newford Herd
System: suckler to beef
Soil type: dry to heavy
Farm cover (kg DM/ha): 745
Demand (kg DM/ha/day): 0
Growth (kg DM/ha/day): 4
We have 75 calves on the ground in 28 days out of a total of 107 cows. There has been one loss and one set of twins. One cow developed E coli mastitis, but we were able to foster her calf successfully on to another cow. There were three abortions here prior to calving – two due to bacterial infection and one injury. One of these cows has been sent for slaughter while the others are being fattened on ad-lib grass silage and 6kg of concentrate.
Average calf birth weight is 42kg and no veterinary intervention has been required thus far. We got 0.75 bags/acre of urea on our driest ground towards the end of last week. Soil temperatures then were sitting at 6°C. That will have obviously come back since but we will still get the benefits of this application in time.
No animals will be turned out during the stormy weather and to take the pressure off housing space a temporary creep area has been set up in the feed passage of one of the sheds.
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