A new three-bay suckler shed was recently completed on the farm of Ivan Austin who farms in partnership with his father Herbert near Coolrain in Co Laois. The farm currently has 56 cows and the Austins run a suckler-to-beef enterprise, but facilities made management difficult.

“Like a lot of yards throughout the country, we had a lot of small sheds where you could fit in five or six cows and their calves but it was difficult for bedding and managing,” Ivan admitted. The new shed with the large creep area has made life much easier.

The shed, which was fabricated and erected by Roy Fairbrother of Albrim Ltd, is 16.2m wide and 14.3m long and is grafted on to an adjoining shed. Four sliding doors are in place on the shed at either end of the creep area and at either end of the feed passage.

The feed passage itself is 4.9m wide while the slatted area is 5.2m wide. Large 14ft 6in slats are in place over the 2.4m deep slatted tank.

A large creep area was also decided upon, which is 6.1m wide. Currently there are no gates in place between the three bays of the slatted area with cows given the full run of the slats. Not only does this allow more area for cows to walk but it also allows for Ivan to house more cows. Similarly, the creep area of the shed is run as one large creep with no dividing gates but they can be added if required.

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While the shed is three bays long, the decision was taken to install a four-bay long tank with a total length of 21.3m. This will allow for future expansion, according to Ivan.

“While I would have liked to build a four-bay shed, financially it would have put me under a lot of pressure and that’s not what I wanted.

“This way I have the extra storage capacity if I need it and it lets me put up another bay again if I want to expand. It also meant that I wasn’t under pressure to go out to fields this spring with slurry and maybe cause damage to land. The tank is always the hardest bit to put in. I can always throw up a shed over it down the line,” Ivan said.

The poor conditions over the past few months have seen farmers under pressure numerous times when it comes to slurry storage as they have been unable to travel on wet land. For this reason, ensuring adequate tank space to see you through the winter should be a key priority for farmers carrying out building work.

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The creep of the shed is fitted with hinged sheeting with temporary meal troughs in place along the back of the shed to allow for supplementary feeding of weanlings. A permanent solution will be installed later this year, according to Ivan.

Either end of the creep is fitted with two gates which allows for the doors of the creep to be opened to allow increased airflow.

The larger creep means that if desired the creep and slatted area could be used to house two different groups independently which Ivan intends to do when finishing bulls out of the shed.

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The shed is approximately 7m high at the apex and with the ridge cap rising to 7.6m it provides outlet ventilation for the full length of the shed. The shed is 4.8m high at the eave at the creep side of the shed while it is 5.7m high at the eave that was grafted on to the existing shed. To comply with ventilation requirements when grafting on to the existing stanchion there was a requirement to leave a continuous opening of 750mm above the roof of the existing shed. If the roof of the shed was grafted straight off the existing stanchions of the adjoining shed, the roof of the shed would have been too low, negatively affecting airflow.

All four sides of the shed are fitted with vented sheeting to provide inlet ventilation while a continuous gap runs below both eaves of the shed to allow for increased air movement due to the width of the shed. Spaced roof sheeting is only in place above the feed passage.

Cement fibre sheeting is also used in the entire roof of the shed. “We would finish bulls in sheds over the summer and have found that the sheds that have cement fibre sheeting fitted are a lot cooler in hot weather. I wouldn’t go with anything else,” Ivan said.

A stub was placed between the old and new stanchions to graft them together. As per the Department specifications, only one stub between the old and new stanchions is permitted. The overlap of both stanchions must be a minimum of 300mm also. In general, the Department outlines that grafting should be avoided but it is permitted in certain circumstances. The existing stanchion must be sufficient in size for both the existing and new building, among other requirements.

Cost

All concrete work was completed by Coolrain Concrete while Albrim Ltd fabricated and erected the shed. Slats were provided by Banagher Concrete which were fitted with EasyFix rubber mats. All internal penning was supplied and fitted by Condon Engineering. Paul Kavanagh of Joe Thompson Electrical completed the electrical fittings. The project began in October of 2016 when Ivan first approached Andy Mulhare from the Environmental Agricultural Engineering Consultancy Ltd to design his proposed shed. Planning permission was applied for and then grant approval was sought. Work began in May with the tank installed. Work was finally completed in November 2017 with cattle housed almost immediately.

“We gave ourselves a bit of time to get things done which meant we weren’t in a panic. Going through the grant does take time but it is worth it to get the payment. I will hopefully get a 60% grant as a young farmer which means my shed will not cost much in the end.”

The total cost of the project came to approximately €77,000. Approximately €10,000 of this was VAT that Ivan was able to claim back. This left €67,000 that was submitted as the payment claim for TAMS. If Ivan successfully gets back the 60% grant aid he will receive €40,200 in grant aid leaving the net cost of the project at approximately €26,800.