Beef farmers Sam Chesney and James Evans also outlined the role of grazed grass on their respective units during the webinar.

“Good grassland management is the easiest way we can make a profit from cattle. Growing grass is easy, but utilising it properly is the challenge” said Chesney.

“We measure growth weekly and monitor feed value every second week. We want swards at a steady 12 ME and 17% protein,” he added.

The Co Down farmer calculates that every 1kg of liveweight gained from grass costs 16.2p/kg on his farm, compared to £1.01 for high genetic merit bulls on an intensive finishing diet.

“We grew 14.5t DM/ha of grass last year and utilised 92% of this, or just over 13t DM/ha. On our farm, every 1t DM/ha increase in grass utilisation is worth an extra £100/ha,” Chesney said.

Organic outlook

Shropshire-based farmer James Evans runs an organic beef unit and is a recent convert to paddock grazing and grass measuring. The 70ha grazing platform is now set up in 1ha paddocks using electric fencing. Every grazing group is serviced with a 100l water trough, which is moved from paddock to paddock, cutting down set-up costs.

Store cattle are grazed in groups of 80 and moved to fresh grass daily. Cows are run in groups of 40 and moved every three days.

“In late autumn, we work on a 24-hour shift, or 12-hour shift when it is wet. It is more work, but it is still cheaper than housing on straw and running machinery to feed cattle,” Evans said.

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