It’s October so I’ve started planning for spring. Might sound a bit odd at first, but whatever field is currently being grazed will be the second to be grazed next spring. The fact is there will be very little real growth next January so February’s grazing must be grown now. I say second field as there’s usually a small number grazing for maybe a few hours in the first week of grazing, so a lighter cover of grass will be more practical for the first field.

The second important part of planning for spring grass is to have enough available. To do that, I plan to use the 60:40 rule. Simply put, I aim to graze 60% of the ground by the end of October and the rest by the end of November. To achieve this on my farm, I must graze an average of 0.97Ha/day this month (60% of 35.6ha divided by 22days) no matter how many cows are grazing.

At first I found this was one of the strangest parts of autumn grazing. It means a complete change in the system used all summer as it may mean grazing lighter covers first. That’s what I’ll have to do this year as I suddenly have a big cover of 1280kg dm/ha. The rain and heat have given a growth of 67kg a day in the last fortnight, compared to mid 30’s in August. Thunderstorms and downpours have been a bit of a challenge overhead but underfoot it has set the farm up to extend the season cheaply.

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Budgeting

A glance through the Farmers’ Journal grasswatch page shows a broad variation of grass covers and stocking rates across the country. It is up to every farmer to design their own budget around the 60:40 rule. Despite the proven benefits of grass budgeting for the whole year, there is still a significant group of farmers who think the technology and figures are too complicated to understand. Because of that, I have deliberately described autumn budgeting in as simple a format as possible. You only need to make sure the right area of ground is being grazed each day. Speed up if necessary by moving to a field with less grass, slow down by feeding extra ration or some silage.

If this seems very basic then great, you’re probably better than me at managing grass.

My aim is to try and get everyone thinking of grass as a crop and measuring grass as a feed the same as silage or concentrates. Further information is contained in the grassland section of www.smartfarming.ie