The year is moving along fast and the Teagasc/Irish Farmers Journal BETTER farm beef challenge walks are only around the corner.

On Tuesday 10 September, John and James Flaherty host a walk on their suckler-to-beef farm in CastleIsland, Co Kerry.

On Thursday 12 September, Tommy Holmes opens up the gates of his suckler- and store-to-beef holding in Ballina, Co Mayo.

Both walks take place at 5pm and will cover a range of topics to make this a successful autumn and winter.

Tommy Holmes

Tommy is operating a suckler- and store-to-beef system on 18ha of good-quality land near Ballina, Co Mayo.

Grassland management is without doubt the strong point on this farm, with 13t to 14t DM/ha/year being grown for the last two years.

This has allowed his stocking rate to jump from 1.9LU/ha to 2.5LU/ha and subsequent gross margin to jump from €430/ha to €721/ha.

Recently, I caught up with Tommy on his farm, along with local adviser Tom Kelly and BETTER farm adviser Tommy Cox.

For more information, read the article inside this week’s Irish Farmers Journal.