I farm: “In partnership with my father Michael and mother Rina on a spring-calving Holstein Friesian dairy farm in Co Wexford. We are farming 205ac between owned and rented land.”

Calving: “We have 127 out of 180 cows calved so far this spring and things are going well. We keep all of the Friesian heifer calves and raise them on a JFC automatic calf feeder. They get 25% protein milk replacer and we find it a great labour-saver.”

Marts: “The rest of the calves are sold between Enniscorthy Mart and Waterford Ross Mart. Once our replacement heifer calves are weaned off milk, we send them to a local contract rearer just outside New Ross. This is our second year using this service and we are very happy with it. At the moment calving is going well, we like to share the work load at home, my father usually does the late nights and I do the early mornings.”

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Breeding: “This is the first year we have used sexed semen and we have found it very successful. I have already picked out an order for this year’s straws from Progressive Genetics. The cows that we did not select for sexed semen were inseminated with Belgian Blue, Charolais and Limousin straws. Then we mop up with Hereford and Angus bulls. I recently did an AI course with Dúnmasc Genetics so the plan is to AI some of the cows myself this year.”

Grazing: “We got the cows out to grass last Saturday for the first time this year. We are leaving them out for a few hours after milking in the morning and evening and bringing them back in just until the ground conditions improve. “There’s lots of grass out there but the weather just wasn’t favourable over the last number of weeks.”

Students: “We host students on the farm, mainly from Denmark and Austria who are studying agriculture in college. We organise it with the agency Equipeople who run the Irish Agricultural Work Experience Programme. Some of the students have no on-farm practical experience and it is a learning curve for them but once they become familiar with the routine, they are a great help. We are also getting a student in next week from Tanzania which was organised through Kildalton Agricultural College and Teagasc Moorpark.”

Macra: “Last year I joined Bree Macra na Feirme. It’s a great way to meet people, socialise and learn new skills.”