The Irish Farmers Journal Save Our Sucklers (SOS) series of events in conjunction with the Irish Farmers Association continue this week with the final events taking place in Kilkenny Mart on Tuesday 13 March, Ennis on Wednesday 14 March and Carnaross Mart on Thursday 15 March. Seven SOS events have already taken place over the past two weeks in Carndonagh, Cootehill, Mohill, Castleisland, Claremorris, Athenry and Elphin.

Attendees at the events have heard from the Irish Farmers Journal livestock team, IFA livestock chair Angus Woods, ICBF personnel, Progressive Genetics breeding advisors and Dovea Genetics breeding advisors. All events start at 7pm in the mart and are free to attend. The events are also KT-approved under the Knowledge Transfer programme.

Numerous issues have came up for discussion including where will funding come from for a support payment. Angus Woods has said that following a successful Dáil motion by Fianna Fáil spokesperson for agriculture, Charlie McConalogue, the Government must now look at underspend in schemes for possible funding for a support payment. He also stated that there is a budget surplus expected this year and some of this could be used as a support to our suckler industry.

There have been a lot of questions around indexes, their reliability and how they can be best used to make breeding decisions. The highlight of each event has been local vets demonstrating a live calving demo, what to do before, during and after calving to make sure calves are born alive and kept healthy.

An interesting breeding demo has also taken place with AI companies and local farmers providing livestock from AI sires for discussion. Tullamore Farm will host over 400 secondary school students on the farm on Thursday 15 March as part of their farm walk and talk 2018 campaign. Students will get to see hands-on what’s happening on the farm including calving and lambing and also hear from our livestock specialists about production systems and the industry.