If climate change predictions come to pass, Irish farmers will have to get more used to dry summers like 2018. If ever there was a year where feed on farms was top of the agenda it was last year. From the cold and late spring, right through to the dry and hot summer, feed availability was the main issue.

But by working together, Irish farmers managed to get through last winter with a surplus of feed left over on most farms.

The importation of feed rose in 2018 and this definitely helped to bridge the deficit. Most of the feed imported came in the form of straights such as soya hulls and palm kernel expeller but a significant quantity of hay and alfalfa was imported also.

One of my most abiding memories of 2018 was sitting in at a stakeholder fodder crisis meeting and being told that there weren’t enough ships in the world to supply all of the feed that Ireland needed. Thankfully, that was one prediction that did not come to pass.

Soil moisture deficit

But back to the present, an apparent soil moisture deficit has slowed grass growth and farmers are beginning to worry if they’re about to head into another drought.

The good news is that feed is plentiful with every meadow in the country full of hay, silage pits bulging to capacity and tillage crops looking good. The other thing is that it’s getting dry at a later stage, being at least one month later than last year.

As for feed, most farmers probably won’t be looking at alternatives this year, but is this the right approach? Alternatives such as forage rape will still have a role to play. While they may not be needed this year, they will help to build up a fodder reserve.

Having this fodder reserve was one of the main lessons learned from 2018, yet it seems to have been forgotten by many already.

With more feed around this year, how do you know what is value and what is not? Teagasc nutritionist Brian Garry describes how to value feed and assess the crop. The key takeaway from this is to spend a bit of time assessing the crop, its yield and its quality before committing to price. Longer-term collaborations between livestock and tillage farmers could be mutually beneficial.