The slurry-spreading season opens for farmers in zone A counties, ie for farmers in Carlow, Cork, Dublin, Kildare, Kilkenny, Laois, Offaly, Tipperary, Waterford, Wexford and Wicklow, on 13 January 2026.

Farmers with a grassland stocking rate of 100kg nitrogen per hectare or greater from grazing livestock manure, prior to the export of livestock manure from the holding in 2025, must use low emission slurry-spreading equipment for the application of slurry on holdings in 2026.

Low emission slurry-spreading equipment must also be used for the application of pig slurry, regardless of the stocking rate on the farm importing the slurry. The same applies for the application of slurry to arable lands, unless the slurry is incorporated in to the soil within 24 hours.

ADVERTISEMENT

Exceptional circumstances

There is an exception to the above ruling, which has now been incorporated in to the sixth Nitrates Action Plan and SI NO. 558 of 2025, European Union (Good Agricultural Practice for Protection of Waters) Regulations 2025. This states that “where for operator health and safety reasons, it would be inappropriate to comply with that requirement due to land within a grassland parcel sloping steeply, it is permitted to spread cattle slurry close to the ground using a downward-facing splashplate. In this scenario, the occupier must keep a record of such spreading including the LPIS number and the spreading date(s)”.

Projecting nitrates figures

The ‘nitrates’ heading section in the new MyAgfood.ie provides farmers with a projected figure for their production in 2025. When clicking on this option, the system will present the user with a graph showing the monthly nitrates figures from bovines on the farm and the projected end of year figure based on current number of bovines. This projection takes in to consideration animals getting older and associated increases in output values from animal’s changing age brackets.

Clicking on ‘my nitrates’ will present more detailed data on the animal numbers and current age categories, and also detail any relevant information on imports and exports of organic nutrients. This can be used as a good indication until such a time as end-of-year figures for the volume of nitrogen and phosphorus have been published.

Slurry imports

Farmers who imported organic nutrients between 1 July and 31 December 2025 must verify such movements by 14 January 2026. These rules apply to all farmers irrespective of their stocking rate. A failure to verify the movement will render the movement void and can have significant implications for the exporting farmers stocking rate compliance.

The movement can be recorded by a farmer or a Farm Advisory System (FAS) adviser approved to act on their behalf. There are two main ways of farmers notifying the Department of an export movement or import verification – through the Department’s Myagfood.ie/agfood.ie portal, or via the Department’s nutrient movement app.