today's farm may-jun 2010

MAY-JUNE 2010 VOLUME 21 NUMBER 3

Sheep Focus- BETTER sheep farms - Choosing Ram breed - Roundworm resistance- Finishing lambs on pasture- Marketing

Angus the answer for this beef farmer 16Kildalton Dairy Group 18Managing BVD 20Using the dairy grass wedge 22Grow your own vegetables 29Fungicide strategies 30Planning retirement finances 32Hen Harriers 35Catchments aim to save you money 36Botanic gardens 38

Perfect Combo:Sheep and Trees 26Perfect Combo:Sheep and Trees 26Sheep Focus

- BETTER sheep farms - Choosing Ram breed - Roundworm resistance- Finishing lambs on pasture- Marketing

Angus the answer for this beef farmer 16Kildalton Dairy Group 18Managing BVD 20Using the dairy grass wedge 22Grow your own vegetables 29Fungicide strategies 30Planning retirement finances 32Hen Harriers 35Catchments aim to save you money 36Botanic gardens 38

10,433 TEAG TODAYS FARM maY_Final Cover 20/04/2010 16:21

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Today’s

farm

May/June 2010 | Today’s farm | 3

COMMENT

Sheepandtrees�aperfect match

MarkMooreEditor,Today’s farm

The best time to plant trees isalways 20 years ago and the besttime to be in sheep is always the

year after you get out.But times arechanging for these two Cinderellaenterprises.You can still get 20 years oftax freepayments forgrowing trees�onaverage, E450/ha, and more forbroadleaves.That’s on top ofthe Single FarmPayment andthose in REPS4can gain furtherbyenteringFEPS.

Additionalbenefits includegrants toestablish thetrees, which youmay be able to doyourself, and fuel,as the forestmatures. Benefitsto theenvironment areanother bonus. Almost every farm hasscope for at least some forestry.

Sheep have seen a slightimprovement in their fortunes and thenew E10/ewe grassland payment is awelcome development.Technology isalso available to boost sheep profits; wehave a major section on sheep in thisedition.Teagasc is a partner in Sheep2010 at Lyons Estate.

Also in this edition, we feature Mayofarmer EugeneMcCartan who has foundthat sheep and forestry/sawmillingmake an almost unbeatablecombination: the work peaks don’t clashand the trees add to existing shelter,noticeably boosting lamb survival.

Is e Today’s farm an iris do chliaint Teagasc. Bıonn altanna teicniula ann faoi chursaıdeirıochta, faoin eallach, faoi chaoirigh agus faoin gcuradoireacht, agus faoi go leor eile. Isminic altanna faoin timpeallacht agus faoi dheiseanna eagsulaithe feirme san iris freisin.Gne an-tabhachtach den iris is ea na haltanna faoin gcaoi le cursaı gno na feirme alaimhseail. Ar na topaicı eile a chludofar amach anseo beidh tairgeadh fuinnimh ar anbhfeirm, an fhoraoiseacht, an ghairneoireacht, srl. Agus beidh altanna ann o thrath gocheile faoi chursaı feirmeoireachta thar lear freisin.

Today’s farm is a bi-monthly publication produced in a joint venture between Teagasc andthe Agricultural Trust, publishers of the Irish Farmers Journal and The Irish Field.

Editor: Mark Moore | Editorial team: Alison Maloney, Joanne Carroll, Eric DonaldChief sub-editor: Leslie Horgan | Sub-editors: Regina Horan, Niamh O’Doherty, |Artwork: Joe Lenehan, Garrett AllenCover design: Design at DBA | Imaging: Owen McGauley, Sean O’FlahertyPrinting: Boylan Print Group, Drogheda, Co Louth | Advertising: Frank McGouranAll Media Matters (01) 4941071 086-8111567 [email protected]

All editorial enquiries to: Teagasc, Oak Park, Carlow Tel: (059) 9170200 Fax: (059) 9183498e-mail: [email protected] | web: www.teagasc.ie

The publishers do not accept responsibility for any private and trade advertisements oradvertising insertions included in this publication. Occasional reference in thismagazine totrade names and proprietary products may be inevitable. No endorsement of namedproducts is intended, nor is any criticism implied of similar products which are notmentioned.

contents4 News5 Upcoming events

Sheep6 Prospects improving

8 BETTER farms

9 Kerry sheepproducer

10 Breeding to beat parasites

11Selecting rams for resistance

12 New weaponagainst worms

13 Alternative forages

14 Lamb Direct

Beef16 Angus the answer

Dairy18 Kildalton Dairy Group

20 Managing BVD

22 Using the grass wedge

Forestry26 Sheepand trees

Horticulture29 Home grown vegetables are best

� and cheapest!

Tillage30 The changing face of septoria

FarmManagement32 Retirement finances

Environment35 Hen Harriers

36 Agricultural Catchment Programme

Botanic gardens38 The art of watering

COVER | caption:Forestryadviser Noel Kennedy,Mayo farmerEugeneMcCartan and sheep adviser GerryMurphy discuss the benefits of running bothsheep and forestry enterprises.See pages 26to 28. Picture:MarkMoore

Sheep haveseen a slightimprovementin theirfortunes andthenewE10/ewegrasslandpayment is awelcomedevelopment

ENVIRONMENT35 Sky dancing Hen Harriers

22/4/1016:38

upcoming events


Today’s

farm

SHEEP2010,UCDLYONSRESEARCHFARM,NEWCASTLE,CODUBLIN, 26JUNE

Sheep2010Michael McHugh,Teagasc, Ballyhaise

TEAGASC,UCD and Sheep Ire-land, in partnership with theIrish Farmers Journal and BordBia, have come together to or-

ganise Sheep2010 at the UCD LyonsResearch Farm, Newcastle, Co Dublin, onSaturday 26 June. While the event will coverall aspects of the Irish sheep industry, themajor focus will be on technology and howtechnical efficiencies can help improveprofits for sheep farmers.

Teagasc, Department of Agriculture,Fisheries andFood,BordBiaandSheepIreland will highlight the key factors inflockmanagement,health,breedingandmarketing that can improve profits insheep.

Demonstrations and seminars willfocus on factors that can improve effi-ciencies at farm level and boost returnsfrom the marketplace. For their mar-keting seminar, Bord Bia have invited anumber of Irish and French sheep meatbuyers to discuss their market require-ments and how Irish sheep farmers canmeet these requirements. Cookery andcarcasedemonstrationswillalso featureon the Bord Bia stand. A seminar invol-ving the Department of Agriculture,

Teagasc and invited speakers willdiscuss the new EID requirementsandhowEID canbe used as a tool toimprove flock management. A flockhealth seminarwill be addressed bypersonnel from the Regional Veter-inary Laboratories, UCD and Tea-gasc.This seminar will focus on thediseases that are of greatest eco-nomic significance on sheep farms� abortion, foot rot and parasitecontrol. Sheep Ireland will exhibitall aspects of the new sheep breedimprovement programme�Lamb-Plus, MALPS and CPT pro-grammes. Seminars anddemonstrations on breeding andbreed improvement will be held atthe Sheep Ireland stand.

TheBelclare,Charollais,Suffolk,Texel and Vendeen sheep societieswill be holding their national breedchampionships at the event.TheYoung Shepherd competition,sponsored by the RDS and orga-nised by Macra na Feirme and theagricultural colleges, also isplanned. In addition, a fencingcompetition and sheepdog trialswill form part of the day’s pro-gramme.The main sponsors of theevent are Kepak, SuperValu andIntervet Schering Plough.

Anyone with an interest in sheepproduction should find Sheep 2010worthwhile.

BALLYHAISEAGRICULTURALCOLLEGEOPENDAY,6MAY,BALLYHAISE,COCAVAN,10.30AM

Regainingcontrolofdairyherd fertilityBrendan Horan,Teagasc Ballyhaise

THE Ballyhaise college systemsexperiment provides dairyfarmers in the border, mid-lands and western (BMW) re-

gions with locally generated researchinformation and technology to securetheirdairy farming livelihoodspostmilkquotas, irrespective of fluctuations inmilk prices, interest rates and inflation.

A key objective of system develop-ment is to realise dairy herd reproduc-tive performance, which facilitatesefficient milk production and allowsdairy farmers to expand herd size postquotas.

The challenge is to achieve high ani-mal performance over a long grazing

season, based on a predominantly pas-ture diet. National statistics show thatreproductive capacity on the averageIrish dairy herd is poor (average na-tional calving date of mid-March, 52% ofanimals calving in six weeks after cal-vingstartdate;CMMS&ICBFstatistics,2009), resulting in significant financial

losses. In contrast, the reproductiveperformance of the Ballyhaise Collegeherd has improved dramatically duringthe last four years, as shown by the re-duction in 13-week empty rates from35% to 17%.

The open day on 6 May will providedairy farmers with research updates onthe Ballyhaise approach to improvingreproductiveperformance, basedon themost up to date information.

Preliminary results from this on-going study demonstrate that consider-able potential exists to increase animalproductivity from pasture in the BMWregion by increasing sward productivityin combination with an appropriatestockingrateandacompact calvinghighEBI herd.

The Ballyhaiseevent isopento

the public on 6 MayatBallyhaise AgriculturalCollege from10.30am

SHEEPFARMWALKS

Tuesday, 11 May Philip Higgins, Leekfield, Skreen, Sligo 6.30pm

Wednesday, 12 May Eamon Markey, Ballymackney,

Carrickmacross, Monaghan 7:00pm

BEEFOPENDAY,TEAGASCGRANGE,COMEATH,15JUNE

TherewillbeaBeefOpendayatTeagascGrange on 15 June�watch out fordetails closer to the event.

22/4/1016:39

6 | Today’s farm | May/June 2010

sheep focusTo

day

’sfarm Focus on factors under yourcontrol

Dr Michael G DiskinTeagasc, Athenry

WHILE the national breed-ing ewe flock has declinedfrom a peak of 4.8 millionin 1992 to 2.60 million

ewes in 2008, sheep production is still amajor farm enterprise.With a farm gatevalue of €171.4m in 2008, the industryaccounted for 3% of Ireland’s GrossAgricultural Output.

Currently, there are 31,756 Irishsheep farmers (CSO 2008), about 1.95million lowland ewes and 0.65 millionhill and mountain ewes. Almost threequarters of our sheep output is ex-ported.The lowland sheep flock ac-counts for 85% of production.

National Farm Survey (NFS) dataclearly shows that well-managed sheepproduction enterprises return grossmargins that compare very favourablywith other dry stock enterprises.TheNFS also shows that the number oflambs reared per ewe joined, stockingrate and concentrate feeding to ewesand lambs are key drivers of profitabil-ity.The improvement in lamb price thisyear, as awell as the recent introductionof the €10/ewe grassland payment,should further improve margins fromsheep production.

There are a number of key compo-nents that individual sheep farms canadopt that will enhance profitability.Specifically, sheep farmers should focuson factors that are under their control,including:Adopt a three to five-year business planfor your sheep enterprise.Here, the fo-cus should be on drivers of profitability.Concentrate on production from grazedgrass. Grass is the cheapest form offeed, and must be central to efficientprofitable lamb production.The objec-tive must be to firstly grow sufficientgrass ,and secondly to maintain qualityleafy grass in front of the ewes andlambs at all stages.There is also scopeon many farms, particularly on dryfarms, to extend the grazing season atboth ends of the year.Develop a plan to provide prolific flockreplacements. Serious lowland sheepproducers must develop a strategy ofproducing, either from within their ownflock or from an outside source, prolificflock replacements. Numerous studiesshow that the female progeny from Bel-clare rams have the capacity to wean1.75 lambs per ewe joined.

Carefully examine the amount ofconcentrate feeding to lambs.There issignificant evidence that on somefarms, excessive amounts of purchasedconcentrates are fed to both ewes andlambs. Much of this is unnecessary, andis doing nothing for profitability, exceptreplacing cheaper grazed grass in the

diet of the ewes and/or lambs. Considercreep-grazing lambs ahead of ewes asan alternative to creep feeding of con-centrates to lambsFlock health plan.Resistance to anthel-mintics is becoming a problem on somefarms. Producers are advised to strate-gically use these drugs and ensure thecorrect dosage is delivered, combinedwith the provision of ‘‘clean pasture’’ tolambs after weaning.Winter shearing of ewes.Research atAthenry has shown that shearing ewesat the start of housing in December willincrease lamb birth weight by about0.50kg andwill increase weaningweightbyabout 2kg, resulting in advancing ageat slaughter by two weeks.This is a sig-nificant and easily-attainable produc-tivity gain that could be financially veryworthwhile, particularly in an environ-ment of declining lambs prices fromJune onwards.Learn fromTeagasc BETTER sheepfarms.Teagasc have established a num-ber of hill and lowland BETTER sheep

farms to accelerate technology transferfrom research to farm practice.Well es-tablished breeding, grassland, nutri-tion and flock health technologies arebeing applied and evaluated on thesefarms.

Discussion groups and B&Tadvisersvisit these farms on a regular basis. Ifnot already a member of a discussiongroup, sheep producers are encouragedto join one, and learn and adopt tech-nologies from these BETTER farms. Asalways, your local Teagasc adviser canprovide sheep advice or put you in touchwith a colleague who can.Further integration of hill and lowlandsectors. In some of the mountain andhill areas, producer groups have beenestablished to produce prolificcrossbred replacements for fat lambproduction on the lowlands.There isscope for further expansion of such in-itiatives, and the certification of theheath status of lambs from these groupswould further enhance their value andattractiveness to lowland buyers.

DrMichael GDiskin, sheep enterprise leader,Teagasc,Mellows Campus,Athenry,Co Galway.

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22/4/1016:40


sheepTo

day

’sfarm BETTER

Farm sheepprogrammeSome pointers

from year one

Akey objective in the BETTERFarm sheep programme is todevelop a management planfor each farm to improve the

bottom line. Objective information onflock performance is an essential ele-ment in this process. During 2009, thesheep flocks involved in the BETTERFarm Programme measured full indivi-dual animal performance based on elec-tronic tagging (EID). All ewes on thesefarms are fitted with EID tags and thefarmers applied EID tags at birth to alllambs born in 2009.

Grass supply was routinely measuredthroughout the grazing season and allinputs and outputs were capturedthrough the recording system used fortheTeagasc National Farm Survey.

As information oneach flockwasbuiltup during 2009, outcomes were exam-ined in detail at meetings involving thefarmer and his B&Tadviser, the sheepspecialist, and research staff fromAthenry.Thesediscussions led toagreedchanges to the management plan as allthe teammembers work towards a thor-oughunderstandingof the strengths andweakness of each farm system.

Some key findings relevant to all sys-tems emerged from this process:* A clear policy is required on flockreplacements, including

�Consistent annual replacementrate and

�Defined breeding policy to gener-ate prolific replacements (lowlandfarms)* Maximise crossbred lamb productionfrom hill flocks.* Output per ewe is key.

�The plans agreed for the BETTERfarm lowland flocks all includeachievingan output of over 1.6 lambs reared perewe joined.This requires a breedingpolicy to deliver ewes with the geneticpotential for litter size of 1.9.

� For BETTER farm hill flocks, thetarget is to get 1.1 lambs reared per ewejoined.This requires a litter size of 1.3.The analyses show that this can beachieved by improving body weight andbody condition at joining.* Lambing spread was excessive in

many cases. The target is to have 90% ofewes lambing within a four-week peri-od. Results from 2009 showed that onlytwo of the flocks achieved this target.* Lambing date should match expectedpattern of grass growth in spring.* A poor grass supply in spring reflectsthe absence of a definite policy onclosing fields in late autumn to provideearly grazing. The grass supply profilesfor 2009 highlight the need for such apolicy.* Grassland management has a majoreffect on both lamb and ewe perfor-mance, unless this is obviated by inputof concentrates (which will impactnegatively on the financial returns).*There is considerable scope to improvelamb growth rate on both lowland andhill flocks without relying on concen-trates. Thus, on two of the lowlandflocks, the vast majority of lambs werefinished off grass alone.* It is crucial to establish the anthel-mintic resistance status of the parasiteson a farm for effective parasite control.The data collected during the 2009season indicated white drench (bend-zimadazole) resistance on some of theBETTER farms — an aspect that will bemonitored closely over the comingseason by regular monitoring of faecalegg count, alongwith testing the variousproducts available.

BETTER farmer John Curley,B&Tadviser Eamonn Eganand Ciaran Lynch.

Ciaran LynchTeagasc Animal ProductionResearch Centre, Athenry

Table1 | BETTER farms

Hill farms Location Teagasc adviser

David McLaughlin Greencastle, Co Donegal John Cannon

Colm O’Donnell Aclare, Co Sligo Tom Coll

James Lally Westport, Co Mayo John Noonan

Lowland farms

David Mc Laughlin Greencastle, Co Donegal John Cannon

John Curley Four Roads, Co Roscommon Eamonn Egan

John Kelly Baltinglass, Co Wicklow Hugh Mahon

Brendan O’Sullivan Cahirciveen Co Kerry Michael Gottstein

22/4/1016:40


Today’s

farm

No regrets for this Kerry sheep farmer

TIMMYand Mary Fleming, withtheir four children, Karol (14),Aiden (12), Sean (10) and Sarah(7), farm in the scenic Muckross

area on lands adjoining the KillarneyNational Park.

‘‘Once I left school, Icouldn’twaittogosheep farming’’ wasTimmy’s commentwhen I asked him why he and his wifeMary chose to be full-time sheep farm-ers.The Fleming family run around 650ewes plus replacements (300 Scottishblackface ewes and350 lowlandewes) on14 hectares (35 acres) of owned green-land plus commonage.The also lease/rent a further 48 adjusted hectares (120acres) about eight miles from the homefarm.

The hill flockThe 300 hill ewes are mated with Scot-tish Blackface rams and are grazed onthe hill areas for the summer. Animalperformance on the hill is very good,particularly as the sheep now have ahuge range, given the number of peoplethat have left hill sheep farming over thelastdecade.Lastyear,eventheeweswithmale Scottish Blackface lambs weregrazed on the hill for the summer andthese lambs averaged30kgatweaning inearly October. Rams are turned out inthe first week of November, so lambingstarts around the first of April.

The lowland flockLowland ewes are of mixed breed, manyhaving been bought in over the last fewyears.

This flock ismatedwith terminal sires(Texel) to produce French market speci-fication lambs, or maternal sires (Bel-clare) to produce prolific flockreplacements for the lowland flock. Allewes lamb outdoors starting in the firstweek of March.

Meal feedingThe Fleming family run a low cost sys-tem. Almost all of the ewes are outwin-tered on either the hill or selectedlowland areas of the farm. A limitedamount of silage is made, which can befed to sheep indoors when necessary.Meal feeding is kept to a minimum.

In general, only triplet bearing andthin ewes receive concentrate supple-mentation prior to lambing. However,this year, due to a lack of grass, virtuallyall sheep were fed concentrates beforelambing.Triplet lambs and lambs off oldthin ewes are run as a separate group(usually about 10% to 15% of the lamb

crop) and have access to creep feed. Allother lambs are fed a grass-only diet un-til October, when meals are introducedto finish off the remaining lambs.

Again, this year, because of the verycold spring and due to the lack of grass,all ewes have been getting 1kg per headper day of pelleted concentrate on theground post-lambing. Meal is fed in themornings only, so that freshly lambedeweswouldhave ample time to find theirlambs during daylight hours, therebyreducing miss-mothering.

Increasing outputBy carrying out aTeagasc eProfit Moni-tor analysis annually,Timmy can bench-mark his costs against other sheepfarmers.

Variable costs on the Fleming farmare low, therefore to make substantialprogress on farm profit increasing out-put has been the main focus.

Because of the commonage land/fra-mework plan, the maximum number ofewes that the farm can hold has beencapped.To increase the output from the

sheepflock, thefollowingstrategieshavebeen adopted:* Increasing litter size of the lowlandflock to 1.7 lambs per ewe. To achievethis, Belclare rams were purchased in2007 and have since been used to sirereplacements for the lowland flock.* Joining ewe lambs with the ram intheir first season. Only well-grown ewelambs are selected as flock replacementsand these are mated as ewe lambs. Forthe past two seasons, a litter size of 1.5lambs per ewe lamb has been achievedwith the Belclare cross ewe lambs.* Increase lamb price. To achieve thisgoal, Timmy is chairman and one of thefounding members of the Ring of KerryQuality Lamb Group, which pays itsmembers a premium price for lambs.This is achieved by marketing lambsdirectly to the end user.

Enthusiasm, high levels of animalperformance, good use of grass andthinking outside of the box has madesheep farming a sustainable careerchoice forTimmyandMary Fleming.

Michael GottsteinTeagasc, Killarney

Timmy Fleming reliesheavilyonhis trustedsheepdogs .

22/4/1017:02


sheepTo

day

’sfarm Breeding canhelp beat parasites

JPHanrahan & B Good,Teagasc Athenry

GASTROINTESTINAL parasite(roundworm) infection inlambs is one of the key flock-health challenges facing

sheep producers. Relying on anthel-mintic treatment alone is not a sustain-able strategy because of the potentialfor the parasite population to developresistance to drugs. A sustainable ap-proach to minimising the effects ofparasite infection on lamb growth mustinclude provision of ‘clean’ swards(swardswith a very low level of infectivelarvae); strategic use of effective an-thelmintic treatment; and selection ofsheep breeds that have higher resis-tance to the roundworm challenge.

It is well established that individualsheep differ in their genetic resistanceto the roundworm species that causeproblems betweenMay and September.Genetic differencesbetweenbreedsandresults fromAthenryare summarised inTable 1. It is clear that there is a majordifference in resistance between Suffolkand Texel sheep. We have an ongoingprogramme in collaboration with DrTorres Sweeney in UCD, using thesebreeds, to identify the genes that areinvolved.

Ultimately, DNA-based tests may bedeveloped to aid selection for improve-ment of resistance in sheep.Research atAthenry shows that the difference be-tween breeds is present not alone inlambs but also in ewes and rams, whichhas implications for any managementstrategy for controlling the effects ofthese parasites under farm conditions.

An obvious question is � what is theimpact of a difference in resistance toparasites on lamb growth? We recentlycompleted a two-year trial atAthenry tocompare the effect of increasedparasitechallenge on performance of Suffolklambs with that onTexel lambs.

The sheep in the study were pure-bredand lambsweredosedat fiveweeksof age to control Nematodirus.Thesheep were grazed either on a ‘clean’sward (a new reseed with minimal levelof parasite challenge) or on a ‘dirty’sward (permanent pasture grazed onlyby sheep for previous 10 years). Lambswere weighed at weaning (14 weeks ofage) and at 18 weeks of age and faecalsamples were collected from each lambat these times tomeasure the number ofroundworm parasite eggs per gramme(faecal egg count).

The key results on lambperformanceand FEC are given inTable 2. It is clearthat exposing Suffolk lambs to parasitechallenge had a significantly greatereffect on liveweight compared with anyeffect on Texel lambs.

At 14 weeks of age (weaning), theSuffolk lambs on the ‘dirty’pasturewere2.1kg lighter than those on ‘clean’ pas-ture, whereas the corresponding effectonTexel lambs was only 0.3kg. By 18weeks of age, the effect of the ‘dirty’pastureonSuffolkswas -4.6kgcomparedwith an effect of only -1kg onTexels.

The Suffolk lambs would haveneeded anthelmintic treatment to re-duce theeffect of theparasite challenge.However, it is unlikely that routine an-thelmintic treatment would have com-pletely eliminated the effect of theincreased parasite challenge on theliveweight of the Suffolk lambs.

IN SHORT | parasites

* Exposure toparasite challengehasamuchgreater effect on the performanceof Suffolkthan onTexel lambs.* Suffolk lambswill benefit most from‘clean’grazing (i.e. pasture that harbours a lowparasite challenge).* If a‘clean’pastureisnot normallyavailable,farmersshouldconsiderusingaterminalsirefrombreeds, such as theTexel, that have aproven capacity to resist parasite challenge.* Where lambshave Suffolk ancestry, their

parasite burdenshould bemonitored (faecal

egg count), so that anthelmintic treatmentcan be administeredwhen required.* Where such treatment is given, it is essen-tial that:

� the parasite population of the farm is sus-

ceptible to the active ingredient in the pro-duct.

� treatment is givenaccording to themanu-

facturer’s instructions.

Table1 | Relative (%) roundwormresistance for sheep breeds and crosses

Breed1

Purebred Crossbred

Suffolk 100 100

Texel 22 40

Belclare 26 -

Ile de 40 -

France

Charollais - 501If Suffolk lambs have a FEC (eggs

per gramme) value of 500, then Texel

lambs are expected to have 110 eggs

per gramme; where Suffolk-x lambs

have a FEC of 500 Texel-x lambs will

have a FEC of 200, etc.

Table 2 | Comparison of Suffolk and Texel lambs under two levels of parasite challenge

Pasture Breed FEC at Weight (kg) at

14 weeks 18 weeks 14 weeks 18 weeks

Clean Suffolk 68 103 36.7 41.7

Texel 47 71 34.6 39.6

Dirty Suffolk 445 677 34.5 37.1

Texel 159 243 34.3 38.6

Seamus Hanrahan says thatexposure toparasite challengehas amuchgreater effect onthe performanceof Suffolk thanonTexel lambs.

22/4/1017:03


Today’s

farm

Rams forterminalcrossingJPHanrahan,Teagasc Athenry

THEmain aspect of a lowlandsheep enterprise that can beaffected by the choice of term-inal sire is lamb growth rate to

slaughter. Breed evaluation studies inTeagasc have shown that there are dif-ferences among breeds when used asterminal sires. Of the threemain breedsused: Suffolk,Texel and Charollais,lambs sired by the Suffolk generallyachieve the fastest growth rate.

There is oneexception to thisgeneralrule � when the ewes involved are Suf-folk-cross type� the breed differencesare eliminated because the Suffolk-sired lambs arenobetter than the lambssired by the other breeds.

TheTexel, in particular, but also theCharollais, is more resistant than theSuffolk.The well-established advan-tage of Texels for producing lambswith lower carcase fatness is unfor-tunately not a major issue given theabsence of a payment system thatrewards leaner carcases.

The next question is � how largeare the differences between rams?The scope for getting a ram that is‘ahead of the posse’ is often over-stated by breeders and commercialfarmers. In a recently completedproject at Athenry,113 rams (mainlySuffolk and Charollais) were evalu-ated under commercial conditions,involving six commercial flocks.

Each ram sired about 70 lambsand these lambs were weighed atvarious timesso that liveweightupto,and at, 120 days of age could be de-termined.The average weight of thesingle lambs was 39kg, so they werewithin a few kilos of slaughter.Thedifferences among the rams for 120-day weight of their progeny aresummarised in Figure 1.

About 15% (about one in seven) ofthe rams had a positive effect of+0.5kg, or greater, on 120-day weightand only 4% (one in 25) had an effectof +1kg or more.These results showthata ramthataddsmore than1kg toprogeny liveweight, compared withhis breed average, is rare. Producersneed to pay attention to all of thefactorswithin their control�suchasnutrition to ensure good birth-weight, attention to pasture man-agement and sward quality.

Identifying individual rams thathave the potential to improve lambperformance requires an effective

genetic evaluation system.The studyreferred to above was conducted whilepedigree ramswerebeing indexedusingtheLeanMeat Index system.The resultsshowed that the information from thissystem did not reliably identify the bet-ter rams.We found no difference be-tween rams with high (top 10%) LMIvalues and ramswithout breeding valueinformation.

The scale of the differences amongrams will reflect the evidence in Figure1; but a new system doesn’t automati-

cally mean we’ll find large geneticdifferences among rams. What we canbe sure of is that if real geneticdifferences among individuals areidentified, that improvement pro-grammes, consistently applied, will in-crease performance and benefitproducers.

Top quality grassland managementandattending to otherhusbandry issuesmust be combined with genetic im-provement to maximise the potential oflowland sheep systems.

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

-1.25 -1 -0.75 -0.5 -0.25 0 0.25 0.5 0.75 1 1.25Pe

rcen

t of r

ams

Sire effect on lamb w eight (kg) at 120 days

Figure 1. Effect of sire on live weight of progeny at 120 days

Ifreal

geneticdifferencesamongindividualsare identifiedthenimprovementprogrammesconsistentlyapplied willincreaseperformanceandbringbenefits toproducers

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Table1 | Table1Anthelmintic groups, route ofadministrationandmode ofaction

Group Class of anthelmintics Colour Route of administration Mode of action

1-BZ Benzimadazoles White Oral Starves the

& Probenzimadazoles worm

2-LM Imadazothiazoles Yellow Oral/Injectable Paralyses the

(Levamisole) & worm

Tetrahydropyrimidines

(Morantel)

3-AV Macrocyclic Lactones: Clear Oral/Injectable Paralyses the

(Avermectins & worm

milbemycins)

4-AD Aminoacetonitrile Orange Oral Paralyses the

derivatives (Monepantel) worm

Table 2 | Key elements of a sustainable parasite control strategy

Establish anthelmintic resistancestatus on your farm* Faecal egg count reduction testUse anthelmintic only when necessary* Do not routinely treat adult ewes pre-mating (very few adult ewes will havesignificant worm burdens at this time towarrant treatment)* Monitor faecal egg count to informdosing decisionsSelect the appropriate anthelminticfor the task* Use a narrow spectrum product wherepossible; e.g. if treating for fluke specifi-cally, then treat with a flukicide not ananthelmintic that kills fluke and worms* Use benzimidazole or levamisole forcontrol of Nematodirus (there is noevidence for anthelmintic resistance inthese worms)Administer drugs effectively� avoidunder dosing* Check accuracy of dosing equipmenton a regular basis* Follow manufacturer’s recommenda-tions* Dose according to the heaviest in thegroup*Deliver drench back over the tongue (to

ensure drug is delivered to the rumen)Reduce dependence onanthelmintics* Plan to have grazing areas with lowerchallenge for susceptible stock, e.g.silage aftermath* Alternate grazing with cattle*Use breeds known to be more resistantto roundwormsPrevent the importation of resistantworms in purchased animals � usean effective quarantine strategy* Treat with moxidectin and monepantelsequentially or monepantel on its ownand keep off pasture for 24 to 48 hours(should have access to feed and waterthough), then turn on to ‘dirty’ pasture(this allows your new sheep to pick upparasites particular to your farm and sodilute any resistant parasites that may beleft inside the animal after the quarantinetreatment)Adopt strategies which maintain asusceptible population of worms onyour farm*Part flock treatment — leave about 10%untreatedSeek advice from veterinarypractitioner/adviser.

Freshhope forwormcontrol?Dr Barbara Good Teagasc, Athenry

WHILE infection with gas-trointestinal parasites(roundworms) is normalfor sheep, problems arise

when animals carry a heavy parasiteburden. Because sheep develop immu-nity with age, young animals are espe-cially prone to parasites, and displaydiseasesymptomssuchasdiarroheaandfailure to thrive.

Good management, including the ap-propriate use of anthelminticswill help.However, the effectiveness is reducedwhen anthelmintic resistant worm po-pulations emerge (i.e. worms that sur-vive anthelmintic treatments at levelsthat would normally kill them). A na-tionwide study of Irish lowland sheepfarms revealed evidence for significantdepartures from ‘best’ treatment prac-tices on some farms, plus high incide-neceofanthelmintic resistance inmid tolate season roundworms. Resistance tobenzimidazole was observed on 95% offlocks and to levamisole in 48% of flocksexamined.

The recent launch of a highly effec-tive, fourth class of wormer (Zolvix,monepantel, Novartis Animal Health)for sheep on the Irish market (Table 1,available on prescription only) en-hances our opportunity to developsuccessful and sustainable controlstrategies. However, farmers must bemindful that, as with all anthelminticson the market, the threat of resistanceto this new drug class also exists.

This is the first new class of anthel-mintic to enter the market in 25 yearsand it is critical that its efficacy is pro-tected through the incorporation of theessential elements for a sustainableworm control strategy in the flock man-agement plan (Table 2). More informa-tion on these recommendations hasbeen published by SCOPS (www.nationalsheep.org.uk).

While farms with multiple drug re-sistance will have no choice but to usemonepantel, guidelines by the company(Novartis) on the use of this new anthel-mintic include its use in the flock once ayear, probably mid-season in lambs(when it is will likely have the most im-pact on worms resistant to other drugsand on productivity), and in quarantinetreatment.

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IN SHORT | the problem

* High levelof lamb performancewasachieved in the study.* Old permanent pasture sustained thesame levelof lamb performance as re-seeded pasture.* Including tyfon in the reseed had nobeneficial effect on lamb performance.* While including chicory in the reseedreduced daily liveweight gain, kill-outpercentagewas improved.* Onsheep farms the reseeding dateshould be based onherbage demand,which is lowest from Julyonwardswhenlambsareweanedandwinter forage re-quirements have been conserved.

Aroleforalternativeforages?DrTimKeady,Teagasc, Athenry

HIGH levels of lamb growthpostweaning canbe achievedfrom grazed grass alone.However, many commercial

producers are unable to finish lambswithout concentrate supplementation.Studies at Athenry have shown thatconcentrate supplementation at pas-ture increases lamb performance but isnoteconomically justified for lambs thatare marketed after the end of June.

In recent years there has been inter-est by producers of mid-season primelamb in growing alternative forages,particularly tyfon, when reseeding pas-ture for lambs post weaning. A recentlycompleted study at Athenry evaluatedthe effects of reseeding and use of tyfonand chicory on the performance ofweaned lambs.

Grazing studyA grazing study compared tyfon andchicory grazed either as pure stands orin combinationwith perennial ryegrass.The performance of lambs grazing oldpermanent pasture was evaluated alsoto determine the benefits from reseed-ing. Paddocks were ploughed andseeded on 29 May to give the followingtreatments:* Perennial ryegrass (PRG)* Chicory plus PRG* Tyfon plus PRG* Chicory* Tyfon

The perennial ryegrass mixture wasbased on intermediate heading vari-eties and is presented inTable 1. The oldpermanent pasture had been grazed byewes for the last 10 years, and had beenused recently for extended grazing. Theold permanent pasture sward was madeup of Meadowgrass 39%, Perennialryegrass 27%, Cocksfoot 11%, Clover8.5%, Timothy 7.5% and weed species7.0%. Weaned lambs grazed the experi-

mental treatments from 7 July untilbeing drafted for slaughter. Lambsweredrafted every threeweeks. The effects ofgrazing treatment on lamb performanceare presented in Table 2. High levels oflamb performance were achieved; theaverage daily liveweight gain being217g/day. Relative to the new perennialryegrass sward, including chicory inthe seed mixture reduced daily live-weight gain by 36g/day but increasedkill-out percentage by 1.2 units. Includ-

ing tyfon in the seed mixture had nobeneficial effect on lamb performance.Grazing pure stands of either tyfon orchicory did not increase animal per-formance compared with lambs grazingthe new reseeded pasture or the oldpermanent pasture. Lambs grazing theold permanent pasture produced thesame daily liveweight gain as the lambson the other treatments.

The distribution of herbage yieldduring the grazing season was influ-enced by the reseeding treatment. Forexample, the new perennial ryegrasssward and the swards which includedperennial ryegrass with either chicoryor tyfon produced the same total drymatter yield during the grazing season.However, the swards containing tyfonproduced higher yields during the firstrotationbut lowerherbageyieldsduringthe subsequent rotations relative tothose containing perennial ryegrassalone or in combination with chicory.

The effect of sward type on lambgrazingdayshasamajor impacton stockcarrying capacity, and on liveweightgain per hectare (Table 3). In thereseeded pastures, relative to perennialryegrass, including either chicory ortyfon in the seed mixture did notincrease lamb liveweight gain per hec-tare. Use of chicory as a pure standresulted in the same lamb performanceas perennial ryegrass (Table 2). Live-weight gain per hectare was reduced by42% due to much reduced stock carry-ing capacity.

Table1 | Grass seedmixture, Athenry

Variety Seeding rate (kg/ha)

Grass - Aberdart 2.5

- Aberstar 9.9

- Greengold 7.4

- Dunluce 7.4

Clover - Chieftain 1.2

- Crusader 1.2

Table 2: Effect of sward type on lamb performance

Sward type

Perennial Tyfon Tyfon Chicory Chicory Old

ryegrass +PRG only +PRG only Permanent

(PRG) pasture

Liveweight gain(g/d) 226 220 213 190 226 219

Kill-out (%) 42.1 42.6 42.9 43.2 43.4 42.1

Table 3: Effect of sward type on lamb output per hectare (relative to PRG)

Sward type

Perennial Tyfon Tyfon Chicory Chicory

ryegrass +PRG only +PRG only

(PRG)

Lamb grazing days 100 94 92 99 56

Liveweight gain (kg/ha) 100 90 87 93 58

DrTim Keady studies a crop of chicory.

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The farmers involvedwith Lamb Direct, picturedwith their refrigerated delivery van (from left): Seamus Hughes,Derryveeney,Tourmakeady; RayCawley,Derryribbeen Clogher;Tom Staunton Shanvalleyard,Tourmakeady; Joe Scahill, Fahburren,Prospect,Westport; MarkWalsh,Knockfin,West-port; John Joyce,Shanafarahaun; Oliver Cawley,Derryribbeen,Clogher, and Phil Staunton,Tourmakeady.

LambDirect�atasteof theWestIn November 2009 eight

sheep farmers from west

Mayo launchedLambDirect

Ltd, selling lamb straight to

households, restaurants, ho-

tels, etc

THE farmers aremembers of theMayoMule andGreyface groupwhich began 25 years ago. Overthe years the group focus has

been on quality and delivering what thecustomer wants.With years of workingclosely together, a level of trust has de-velopedtoenablethemcometogether toform this company.They know eachother well and some are neighbours.Four come fromTourmakeady, with theremainder from aroundWestport town.

There is a great tradition of sheepfarming in these areas, with sheep bestsuited to the poorer uplands and thescarcity of good quality land to producelarge quantities of winter feed.

The sheep are adapted to grazing thepoor quality vegetation and are an im-portant factor in sustaining these areas.Over the lasttwoyearsmanynightswerespent researching the project, with a

study tour of Wales, sponsored by Con-nacht Gold, 18 months ago.The localLeader company part-funded a feasi-bility study and they also have receivedconstant help and advice fromTeagascand Bord Bia.

Such is their determination and be-lief in their product, that the eightfarmers invested their own money inbuying a van and expensive packagingequipment to get up and running: theyhave received no grant aid in establish-ingcosts.Sincethe launch, thegrouphasbeenverybusywithmonthlytargets andthey’ve exceeded their business plan.

These farmers want to have morecontrol of the product that leaves thefarmgate as they know it is high qualityandtheywanttheconsumer togetbettervalue for money too. Research carriedout by Bord Bia indicates that peopleprefer to buy local produce and this isborne out by the demand since thelaunch.

The production systemLambs are born in March and April andare reared and finished on grass, withsomeconcentratesusedifgrasssupply isscarce.The grass diet is species-rich asthe ground varies from extensive low-land to upland grassland and blanketbog, giving a distinctive taste and colourto the meat.There is a high percentageof native blackface mountain in thebreeding of the lambs, giving the pro-duct extra flavour and texture.All lambsare castrated, as group members areveryconscious of taint, andno lambs arefinished indoors.

The groupare in theBordBiaqualityassurance scheme.The group were re-cently in the final for theJFCInnovationAwards for farm business, where thewere highly commended on their pro-duct and progress to date.

Contacting the groupThe group have a website: lamb direct.Order online/or by phone at 094-9544163. Customers canbuywhole lamb,either lowland or hill lamb, half carcaseor fully packaged to the highest stan-dards.

They are finalising a barbeque packof a range of sausages, burgers filletsand chops for the summer season.

This is a great example of farmerswho are caught in a price-cost squeezedoing something about it. It’s early days,but it looks as if their initiative will berewarded.

Customerscanbuywhole

lamb, either lowland orhill lamb, half carcaseor fullypackagedtothehighest standards.Orderonline/or byphoneat094-9544163

John NoonanTeagascWestport

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beefTo

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the answeronthis farm

TOMMIEHolmes, who farmsthree miles west of Ballina inCo Mayo, is currently develop-ing a suckler herd of Angus

cows to produce Certified Irish AngusBeef. He has 17 Angus-cross cows andbuys a similar number of weanlings toproduce Certified Angus beef.

Tommiehas anoff-farm jobandchosethe Angus breed for their ease of man-agement, especially around calving. Hehasn’t pulled a calf for the past twoyearsand thecalvesarequicklyonto their feetto suckle after being calved.

The second reason for choosing An-gus is the premium available to produ-cers of Angus beef who are members ofthe Certified Angus Producers Group.

The plan to date has been to haveboth bullocks and heifers finished offgrass before the second winter asTom-mie has limited shed space. In the pastfew years, he has not fully achieved thistarget, and the result was that a propor-tion of steers were sold live at the martwhere the premium is not obtained.

This year the plan is to finish theheaviest yearlings out of the shed asbulls while the rest of the bull yearlingsand the heifers have gone to grass inApril. Meal will be introduced to thebulls in lateJuneandtheywillbehoused

in July for finishing on a high concen-trate diet.

The heifers will be finished off grassin the autumn, having received about3kg meal/day in the final six weeks.

In this system,Tommie will get overthe problem of limited housing whileincreasing beef output and getting allprogeny finished.As thebull systemwillneed less land,he intends to increasehiscow numbers to maintain the stockingrate at the current level of 1.8 LU/ha.

Herd performanceWhen I called toTommie on 30 Marchlast,15 out of his 17 cowshadcalved,with16 calves at foot. Calving started on 2February, so 88% of his cows had calvedwithin eightweeks. Avery good target isto have 80% of the herd calved within 10weeks.He runsa stockbullwith the cowsand the bull is joined with the herd onabout 20 April.

Good cow condition at calving andmating contributed to satisfactory fer-tility and there is no big effort requiredtomaintain a calving interval of close to365 days. Carcaseweights average about320kg for the steers and 260kg for theheifers at 18 to 20 months of age.

The best of the bulls that were put onanad libconcentratediet for finishing inMay weighed about 620kg at slaughterAlan Nolan,Teagasc B&Tadviser,Ballina, and Tommie Holmes examine the yearling bulls after

turnout.

Thebasepriceis fixed weekly

in conjunctionwith theQuality PaymentSystem (QPS) grid.There isanAngusBeefPremiumof10c/kg

Liam Fitzgerald,Beef Specialist,Teagasc, Athenry,withAlan Nolan,Teagasc, Ballina

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CertifiedAngus:terms andconditionsCharles Smith is administration offi-cer of the Certified Irish Angus Beefscheme on behalf of the Irish Aberd-een Angus Producers Group.

Heoutlined thefollowing termsandconditions:* All animals must be sired by a

purebred registered Angus bull or

AI, and this must be shown on

identify cards.

* All animals must be polled.

*Animals must be a minimum of 70

days in the final producer’s herds.

* Animals must be booked with the

producer group prior to slaughter.

* Producers must be a member of

the Bord Bia Beef Quality Assur-

ance Scheme.

Charles said that the two out-of-season periods are generally fromthe second week of May to early Julyand from the second weekof Novem-ber toabout15January.Dairy farmerswill supply the bulk of the product inspring while beef farmers supply thelate summer/autumnmarket.

Young bulls can fit in well to thescarce period in early summer andboth steers and heifers can be fin-ished to supply the Christmas trade.The weight range for steers is 230kgto 400kg carcase and for heifers220kg to 400kg carcase; both mustbeunder 30 months of age.

Thebull carcaseweight range issimilar to steers but theymust beunder24monthsatslaughter.CharlesSmith said theycanhandleup to 40%of themale slaughterings as bulls.

while the rest that went to grass in Aprilweighed 341kg in mid-March at 12 to 13months of age.

Future plansTommiehopes to finishallmales asbullsif this year’s group turn out to be satis-factoryandto increasethecownumbers.At present he rears some replacementsand buys the remainder. He wants toimprove the cow quality by introducingsome Limousin cross replacements andis aiming to get cowswith bettermilkingability.

Market for certified Angus beefCertified Angus beef is a niche marketthat has been developed since it waslaunched in 2000.

As such, the supply is controlled bythe capacityof premiummarkets,withinthe overall beef market, to take the pro-duction level while maintaining a pre-mium price.

Angus cattle, bred and reared underthe conditions of the scheme, areslaughtered in the AIBP plants atWaterford andBandonand in theKepakplants at Clonee, Athleague andWater-grasshill.

TheTesco chain, which is supplied byAIBP, is the biggest outlet and requires300 to 340 cattle per week.

Certified IrishAngus beef is also soldin the Aldi supermarket chain and in anumber of independent butchers andrestaurants. Pingo Doce in Portugal isthe main export outlet.

The product can be recognised instoresbytheapprovedcertification logoon the label.

Producers must be members of theBord Bia Beef Quality AssuranceScheme.

Price premium* The base price is fixed weekly inconjunction with the Quality PaymentSystem (QPS) grid.* There is an Angus Beef Premium of10c/kg.*The Quality Assurance Bonus of 6c/kgis paid on in-spec carcases.* The Angus Premium and QualityAssurance Premium are paid on car-case grades on the grid, i.e. from U+ toO= in conformation and 2+ to 4+(inclusive) on fat score. It excludes O-and P and fat score 5.* An additional premium of 5c/kg isadded to the Angus Premium for out-of-season production, the dates of whichare agreed in advance.*A deduction of €6peranimal ismadeatslaughter to cover administration andpromotion costs. Charles Smith

Yearling Angus bulls at grass.

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James Ryan profiles

the young dairy group

who are managing the

Herd 1250 project at

Kildalton College

‘‘I’M getting to use the experi-ence I gained in New Zealandon the Herd 1250 project inKildalton,’’ said Bill Keane

from CoWaterford, one of 18 studentsstudying for theAdvancedCertificate inDairy Herd Management at Kildaltonand one of the eight who spent fourmonths onplacement inNewZealand aspart of the work experience module ofthe course.

‘‘Grass is king in New Zealand and alldecisions relate to farm cover,’’ he said.‘‘Keeping average farm cover at the cor-rect target and making good use of thegrass wedge, coupled with a compactcalving season, are top priorities forNew Zealand dairy farmers.

‘‘Pasture management in New Zeal-and is one of themost important parts ofa successful farm.Each farmerknowshisaverage growth rates and, using this in-formation, he can predict times of theyearwhengrasswill growat its peakandmake decisions accordingly.

‘‘Rotation length is the driving factorto pasture control and varies fromaround60days atthe start of calving to amuch quicker 18 to 20 days during the

main growing season.’’ The youngWaterford man is milking 135 cows inpartnership with his parents in Stradb-ally. Bill intends to put into practice theprinciples of grassland management heacquired in New Zealand. ‘‘I am ex-panding theherdandhope tobemilking250 cows in the next five years,’’ he said.

The 1250 project is one of the ele-ments of the Advanced Certificate inDairy Herd Management in Kildaltonthisyear.Theherdconsistsof30cows, sixreplacements and six heifer calves on amilking platform of 12 hectares.Winterfeedmust alsobe takenoff this platform.

The dairy students who decide theday-to-day running of the project meetevery Monday morning to review thepast week andmake decisions for thecoming seven days.

John Mooney from Co Laois is secre-taryof theproject.‘‘We’redelighted tobeinvolved in the project and the experi-ence and confidence that it generatescan only drive us forward to be betterdairy and grassland farmers,’’ he said.

‘‘I completed my work experience atKevin Flynn’s farm in Roseinallis, CoLaois, on a high production herd and Ifeel I’m building on that by managingthis herd in Kildalton.

‘‘We’re working together to operate alow cost herd.We have a budget of €100variable costs per cow up to the end ofMay and we are completely focused onkeeping costs down to meet this ambi-tious target. Imust saythat it’s a real eyeopener.’’

Denis Cody,Templemore, CoTipper-

ary, completed his work experience onthe farms ofKevinCummins,WestmeathandWilliam Kingston, Skibbereen. De-nis is looking toexpandthe150-cowherdwhich he runs in partnership with hisparents.

‘‘First rotation management andearly turnout are key to driving highoutput perhectare,’’saidDenis.‘‘This, inconjunction with a crossbred herd, arethe key factors driving increased outputof milk solids and overall net profit.Weare using these key drivers on the Herd1250 project and I now have the confi-dence to adapt these technologies onmyhome farm.’’

Johnny Cronin fromMidleton man-ages a herd of 240 cowswith his parents.Having spent four months in New Zeal-and on work placement, what did John-ny learn from his time with the Kiwifarmers?

‘‘Grass measuring is key to propergrassland management, and once youare able to measure grass, you can thenutilise it fully,’’ he said. ‘‘I now have theconfidence to eyeball grass and calcu-late average farm cover. It makes thedecisions for me, and if I have enoughgrass, I let my cows out. It makes dairyfarming easy!’’

Austin Kirwan, Banagher, Co Offaly,and John Deevy, Ballyraggett, Co Kilk-enny, are also part of the Kildalton 1250Discussion group which was formed toparticipate in the Dairy Efficiency Pro-gramme. John, who completed his pla-cement in Kilkenny on the farm ofStephen Campion, and was dairy stu-

James Ryan,Kildalton College

Denis Cody,Templemore,CoTipperary, looking to expand the 150-cowherdwhich he runs in part-nershipwith his parents.

Bill Keane,Stradbally,CoWaterford, with NewZealand host farmer Steve Schmackof Rakaia,Christchurch.

Studentsarehands-on

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dent of the year in 2009, recognises theimportance of discussion groups.

‘‘The group will meet on the lastWednesdayof everymonth on one of ourfarms and I’m looking forward to thegroup session on my farm in May,’’ hesaid. ‘‘Iwill have my physical plannercompleted and, hopefully, we will get agood discussion on my short and long-term plans.’’

Austin is part of the managementteam that runs the Herd 1250 project.‘‘We are currently milking 100 cows athome, andmanaging the 1250 herd heregives us the confidence to use thesetechnologies on the home herd.We areconstantly making decisions, from howmuch grass to allocate the cows, topractising on-off grazing and sticking tothe rotational planner.

‘‘Performance is the driving forcebehind theHerd 1250.Wehave just comethrough theworst spring in our lifetimesbut nowwe are backon track. Cows havestarted the second rotation and aregoing into covers of 1,000kg DM/ha.

Overall farm cover is 772kg DM/ha, withno meals.We have closed for silage andthis has pusheddemand to 69kgDM/ha/day on a stocking rate of 4.3 LU/ha.

‘‘Breeding started on 12 April and wehave picked a team of four bulls � SOK,TIO, SKVand RVW. Milk yield is cur-rently 23kg at 4.1% butterfat and 3.2%protein (20April figures). Cowswere outby the end of January and we were allo-cating them an allowance of 6kg grassDM, 3kg meal and 5kg maize.

‘‘We made our first big mistake bygiving the cows toomuchmaize at night;� all the cows did was lie down in thefield.We soonmanaged to have the cowsgoing outwith an edge on their appetiteand hitting residuals of 50kg. It was oneof the biggest lessons that I learned im-mediatelyand, as a group,weareall nowconfident of never repeating this andusing top quality feed in the form ofgrass fully.

‘‘We meet with an advisory groupevery fewweekswhich isverybeneficial.We need re-assurance and guidance andit fills you with confidence to know thatyou are managing the project in thecorrect way.’’

Edward Hughes from Johnstown, CoKilkenny, sees that advantage of thisproject. ‘‘We have done all the setting upof this project from the fencing at thestart to the grass allocation and dailymanagement now. At home we run aherd of 62 cows but I intend to expandand, given the experience I have gath-ered on this project, I am looking for-ward to putting all this into practice.

This, in conjunction with my placementwith Michael Power in Urlingford,means that I am ready to seriously pushforward in grass and milk production.’’

Declan O’Meara from Portroe, CoTipperary, was not a student in Kildal-ton in first yearbut joined theAdvancedCertificate in Dairy Herd Managementlast September.

‘‘I completed my placement in NewZealand and am nowapplying thesetechnologies to my home herd of 150cows,’’ he said.

‘‘I have trained as a DIYAI operatoron the course and can use this skill backhome too.When we go on our weeklyvisits to topdairyfarmers, Itrytopickupone small piece of information that I canuse. I know I’ll need support when I re-turnhomesothe ladsstayingtogetherasa discussion group is great and I’mlooking forward to reaping the benefitsof this.’’

Tomas Coonan fromMuckalee, CoKilkenny, intends to take over manage-ment of the home farm immediately oncompletion of the course.

‘‘I am currently milking 60 cows but,after just building a newmilking par-lour, I am ready to expand quickly. I’mgoing to use AI on the whole herd start-ing this year and push expansion basedon highEBI bulls picked from the activebull list.

‘‘As a group, we all have access to ourherd EBI from ICBFand I can see thebenefits of using this information to addvalue to my herd and, ultimately, leaveme with more net profit.’’

James Ryan (front left) with Kildalton dairy students John Byrne, James Barry,Padraig Ryan, Johnny Cronin,Ricky Oliver,Tomas Coonan,EdwardHughes, JohnMooney,Kevin Croke,Bill Keane,Pat Loughman,Tomas Lyng,ChrisTuffy and Austin Kirwan.

inKildaltondairygroup

The1250project is one

of the elements of theAdvanced Certificatein Dairy HerdManagement inKildalton this year

22/4/1017:37


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The four key steps to addressing BVD:* Have a plan* Investigate your herd status* Implement a control programme* Monitor your status

Have a planThe starting point in addressing BVD isto talkwithyourvetaboutwhatyouwantto do in yourherd.For some farmers thiswill be driven by the problems they arehaving with poor fertility, calf health oran outbreak of clinical BVD, called Mu-cosal Disease.

For others it might be motivated byjustwanting to know theirherd status orto become BVD-free.

Investigate your herd statusMost farmers don’t know theirherdBVDstatus, so you’re not alone.With the re-cent introduction of cheaper, more con-venient and better diagnostic tests, youcan now establish this quite easily.Thestarting point is to screen your milkingherd by collecting a bulk milk sampleand to screen your young stock or beefstock by collecting blood samples.This

will allow you and your vet to classifyyour herd status as unexposed or ex-posed, with low to high risk.

Where a high risk is identified, it isrecommended to individually test allanimals in the herd to identify virus-po-sitive cattle using blood, milk or earnotch samples. As foetuses in pregnantcows can’t be tested, they need to besampled once they are born.

Implement a control programmeNow that you know your herd status andvirus-positive cattle have been identi-fied, a control programme should bedeveloped with your vet.Three simplethings need to be done. Firstly, immedi-ately cull any PIs detected. Secondly,reduce the risk of BVD re-introductionto your herd through good biosecurity.Closeyourherd. If this isn’tpossible, testincoming cattle for virus before move-ment. If this isn’t possible, quarantinethem on arrival and test them virus-ne-gative before mixing with your ownstock. Remember to also test the calvesfrom purchased stock.

Improve your boundaries to preventnose-to-nose contact and break-outs/break-ins. And last, but not least, in-crease the immunity of your cattle toBVD.This can be done through vaccina-tion.

VaccinationThe ideal time to vaccinate your stock isbefore breeding. Now is a good time todiscuss the pros and cons of the threevaccines that offer foetal protection

BVDAnewapproachto control

BVDwas ranked the most im-portant infectious disease bydairy and beef farmers in arecent survey of ICBFclients.

The survey was carried out by AnimalHealth Ireland (AHI) to prioritisediseases/conditions requiring action toimprove our national animal healthstatus.

AHIAnimal Health Ireland is a partnershipapproach to animal health that bringstogether livestock producers, proces-sors, animal health advisers and theGovernment.The main aims of the or-ganisation are, through superior animalhealth and welfare, to improve overallprofitability for individual farmers andthe agri-food industry.

AHIwill not become involved in thedirect provisionof services at farm level,which will continue to be delivered byveterinarians,Teagasc advisers andothers, but the organisation will play animportant role in co-ordinating the ef-forts of the various service providers.

AHI has now embarked on the pro-cess of bringing togetherTechnicalWorking Groups (TWG), consisting ofexperienced practitioners and otherexperts.Teagasc staff are playing a keyrole in supporting this national initia-tive throughactiveparticipation inall oftheseTWG.

Their task will be to establish na-tionally-agreed protocols for the inves-tigation, management and monitoringof each of the prioritised diseases/con-ditions.These protocols will be collatedin the form of a series of technical notes,the first of which, on BVD, has beenpublished recently (www.animal-healthireland.ie).

BVD — now is the time to actWe are now facing into a critical time ofthe year for BVD disease spread andcontrol in spring-calving herds. Ifbreeding femalesbecomeinfected inthefirst fourmonthsofpregnancy, the resultcan be embryo mortality or persistentinfection (PI) of the foetus.

What should I doabo

What is a PI?A persistently infected (PI) animal is onewhich was infected in the first four monthsof pregnancy. PIs may be normal at birthand thereafter but shed virus at high levelsfor life. Because of this, detection andculling of PIs is the most important aspectof BVD control.

JohnMee,Teagasc,Moorepark

22/4/1017:37


Today’s

farm

Designing the future of farming

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out BVD?

(Bovidec, Bovilis BVD and PregsureBVD)with your vet. Unfortunately, manyfarmers go straight to vaccination tosolve a BVD problem without goingthrough the two steps outlined above�planningandinvestigating.Thiscanleadto poor results, which are sometimesblamed on the vaccine not working,though vaccine breakdowns do occa-sionally occur.And don’t forget the bull; he needs a‘shot’ too, whether or not he’s vasecto-mised.

Monitor your statusThe only way to know if the money youspent on investigating and controllingthis disease has paid off is bymonitoringyour herd BVD status and your herd’sanimal ongoing health performance.This is especially important in openherdswhere cattle are regularlybought-

in and not tested or quarantined.Teagasc surveysofdairyfarmers show

that only 25%of herds are closed; 90%offarmers do not test bought-in cattle,other than forTB and brucellosis, andonly 20% of farmers quarantine pur-chased stock. Monitor new stock cominginto the herd, whether they are home-grown replacements or bought-in stock,by testing for virus. New-born calves canbe tested using eitherblood or ear notchsamples.Repeattheherdscreeningtestsoutlined above at least annually. Andkeep an eye out for possible signs ofclinical disease, e.g. late repeats, moreabortions than normal, birth defects oran increase in scour and pneumonia.

BVD is obviously not the only cause ofthese common animal health problems,but by having a good BVD control pro-grammeupandrunning inyourherd,youcan rule it out.

Surveys ofdairy farmers

show that only 25%ofherds are closed; 90%of farmers do not testbought-in cattle, otherthan forTB andbrucellosis, and only20%of farmersquarantine purchasedstock

BVD can be carried in bovine saliva/faeces, on clothingand equipment.Tohelp reduce this spread, havewellmaintained footbaths and en-sure that all visitorsuse them.

www.animalhealthireland.ie

22/4/1017:37


dairyingTo

day

’sfarm Use the summer

grass wedgeOver 6,000 dairy farmers will complete grass-

landwedges for their farms this year. It is one of

the requirements under the Dairy Efficiency

Programme for discussion groups

Awedge is avisualpictureof thegrass situation on your farm,showingtheamountofgrass ineach paddock in a graph for-

mat and what cover you need to begrazing for the week.Why complete awedge? Research has shown that 0.5gallons/cow/day (two litres) can begained on most dairy farms by improv-ing the quality of grass that the cowgrazesperdayduringsummer.GrasshasatendencytoproducestemfromApril toJune which lowers overall grass digesti-ble.The less stem the cowgrazes and themore leaf, the higher the production percow, regardless of stocking rate.

Three grazing plansTeagasc promote the use of three meth-ods of managing grass during the graz-ingseason.Thesummerwedgeis thetoolto use for the next three months:* Mid-April to 1 August — use theSummer Grass Wedge.*1 August to housing—use the AutumnClosing Planner* February to mid-April — use theSpring Rotation Planner.

How to complete a wedgeThe wedge should be completed on aweekly basis.To complete a wedge, youneed to:*Have paddocks numbered and, ideally,of equal size. This may involve group-ing small paddocks or splitting largerones.

* Walk the farm and estimate cover oneach paddock.*Each paddock is represented by a solidline on the page, starting with thehighest cover and finishing with thelowest. This is your wedge. It can becompleted manually or on computer.* Establish the grass cover you shouldbe leaving behind after the paddock isgrazed (known as residual cover).Grazed out cover should range form 0 to100kg/ha.* Establish the ideal pre-grazing cover(what cows should be grazing) for yourfarm from the formula shown inTable1.*Draw the target line on the graph overthe wedge, starting with your grazingout cover to the ideal pre-grazing cover.The wedge is now complete.

Where all the paddocks reach thetarget line, thenthis is theperfectwedge(Figure 1). In this scenario, cows arelikely to be grazing ideal quality grassfor the next week, with no shortage ordeficit looming.

In reality, the wedge will vary fromweek toweek. It needs to be interpretedeachweek, taking into accountthe likelychanges that will occur over the nextweek.

Farmer experienceOne farmer who uses the grass wedge isHenryWalsh, Oranmore, Co Galway.Henry operates a spring calving herd of155 cows, stocked at 2.9 cows perhectareon the milking platform.

Calving starts on10February.Heifersare reared onanoutfarmandadditionalsilage for the cows is produced on thisfarm.

Bull calvesaresoldatbirth.Lastyear,1,150kg milk solids/ha were producedfrom the milking platform.

>> Page 24

Pat Clarke,Teagasc,Athenry

Table1 | Establishing ideal pre-grazing cover

Stocking Rate Allowance Rotation Residual Ideal pre-grazing

(cows/ha) (kg DM/cow/day) Length (days) (kg/DM) cover (kg DM/ha)

a b c d (a x b x c - d)

4.12 17 20 50 1,452

22/4/1017:38


Today’s

farm

Figure 2: Farmer wedge, May 2009, showing a grass deficit1328

0

200

400

600

800

1000

1200

1400

0 27 0 26 94 71 28 4 73 66 8 24 25 44 32 41 67 5 6 10 65 23 16 81 15 61 34 31 33 91 14 11 92 54 55 9 1 75 22 12 13 53 93 74 30 82 83 19 0 0 29 21 7

kg DM/ha

Cover/ paddockTarget cover line

1452

0

200

400

600

800

1000

1200

1400

1600

28 10 29 9 1 2 14 3 21 13 7 4 11 20 12 8 12a 22 16 18 23 17 19 6 5 15 27


kg DM/ha

Figure 1: Farm wedge where all paddocks match the target line

Researchhas shownthat 0.5gallons/cow/day(two litres)can begained onmost dairyfarms byimprovingthe qualityof grassthat thecowgrazes perday duringsummer

HenryWalsh (right),Oranmore,CoGalway, discusses his grasswedgewithTeagasc adviserTomMurphy.

22/4/1017:39


dairyingTo

day

’sfarm

During the main grazing season, Henryoperates close to a 21-day rotation, with27 units N applied after each grazing.Surplus grass is removed as baled silagefrom the milking block.

EveryMonday,afterbreakfast,Henrywalks the farm and completes a graphcover. He inputs the data onto the com-puter and creates his wedge for thatweek.This is the base for grassland de-cisions for the week. Measurement ispredominantly done by eyeballing; theclippers is used occasionally to keep hiseye in touch.Henry is also amember of adiscussion group.They meet once a

month, with the main emphasis ongrassland measurement and manage-ment. Henry aims to graze covers ofabout 1,400kg DM/ha and remove sur-pluses over the whole season. Figures 2(previous page) and 3 show two wedgesfrom Henry’s farm last year.

The first is fromMay when theweather was wet and cold.The secondwas frommid-summer when conditionshad improved. At a glance, there ap-pears to be a lot of paddocks in thewedge�usuallythree to fouraregrazedtogether as one paddock. For measure-ment, Henry keeps them separate, but

they could be grouped together in thewedge to reduce the number of lines.

The wedge in Figure 2 was takenduringMay 2009 when there was a cleardeficit of grass on the farm.‘‘Mydecisionwas to introduce 2kg ration for theweek.This was not sufficient feed to make upthe deficit, but I anticipated highergrowth rates for the next seven days.Demand was 54 at the time; growth ratewas due to exceed this,’’ recalled Henryfrom notes in his grass diary.

According toHenry, the big benefit ofcompleting a wedge each week is thatyou can see the result of your decisionsthe next week. Depending on how thesituation had changed, meal could beeliminatedor increased.Clearly, there issurplus grass in his mid-summer wedge(Figure3) for 2009. That week, a numberof the high covers (equivalent to 10% ofthe grazing) were cut for baled silage.

Henry said: ‘‘These bales provide va-luable feedagain formilkingcows. Iwishthey were available in March this year.’’Thisactioncorrected thewedgeandhadthe paddocks back in the grazing systemimmediately.

Through his local Teagasc adviser,TomMurphy, Henryalso submitsweeklygrass data, milk details and his man-agement notes to the local newspaper.

Figure 3: Farmer wedge, July 2009, showing a grass surplus


4 64 15 8 34 9 63 65 75 73 44 5 72 12 25 41 6 74 52 11 22 13 83 82 16 31 91 51 94 33 92 93 7 26 28 81 27 66 24 67 23 30 21 62 61 19 71 10 54 1 53 29 32 14 550

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

1328 kg DM/ha

Awedge is avisual picture of the grass situation onyour farm,showing the amount of grass in each paddock in a graph format andwhat cover youneed to be grazing for theweek (see Figure 3,above left).Harvesting grass (see above) is themost accuratewayto judge grass covers for feeding cattle.

22/4/1017:39


Today’s

farm

KOOLSTAR FLOODEDEVAPORATOR COOLING SYSTEMS

See our State of the Art Bulk Milk Tank and CoolingSystem at Greenfield Farm in Kilkenny.

We stock a large range of second hand bulk milk tanksof various capacities and makes.

DARI-KOOL®

Supplied by:

Railway Rd.,Charleville Phone: 063 89101

Manual grass wedgeThese pages are taken from the Moorepark grazingbooklet.They are an alternative method of creating agrass wedge to a computer package.The wedge can becreated in the field in a matter of minutes after you com-plete your farm walk. Copies are available at your localTeagasc office.

22/4/1017:39


forestryTo

day

’sfarm

Eugene McCartan comes

froma celebratedGaelic foot-

ball family.Nowheisgaining

his own reputation, with a

business, including trees and

sheep, on the banks of the

river Robe in Mayo. Noel

Kennedy, Teagasc Forestry

DevelopmentOfficer, reports

Ahighly skilled sheep farmer,Eugene McCartan has a pas-sion for trees � planting, nur-turing, harvesting and even

talking about them� it’s in the blood.His family have been tree planting, tim-ber harvesting and milling wood in Hol-lymount, between Claremorris andBallinrobe, since the 1940s.

ThoughEugeneseeshimself first andforemost as a sheep producer, he hasrealised, like many farmers, that with ayoung familytoprovide for, heneeded tolook beyond his 250 ewe sheep enter-prise to generate income.

Eugene’s late father, also Eugene,maintained that their family was bornwith ‘sawdust in their veins’ and it wasinevitable that trees and timber wouldfeature prominently in Eugene’s think-ing. Over the past nine years he has in-vested substantially in his land throughnewwoodland planting, management ofthe beautiful older woodlands and theharvesting and processing of forestthinnings.Eugenesaidhehas foundthatthe income and work profiles of the twoenterprises complement each other.

Woodland expansionThe farm of 110 hectares includes 20hectares of mature beech, ash, oak, sy-camore and spruce, and Eugene hasbeen involved inwoodlandmanagement

since the 1980s. In 2001 he planted 13hectares of poor bog with sitka spruceand lodgepole pine.The following year,he planted three hectares of ash andimproved six hectares of existingbroadleaf woodland under theWood-land Improvement Scheme.

Later he planted 2.5 hectares of new

native woodland and improved sevenhectares of older native woodland.Thistime,Eugeneorganisedmostof theworkhimself rather than using a contractorand was assisted by his registered for-ester,TomStaunton ofWesternForestryCo-op.The payments under the variousschemes thatEugene has availed of overthe years have been key to his income.

In 2009 Eugene took on his biggestforestry challenge by himself, planting16 hectares along the Robe river nearHollymount village. As a REPS farmer,he qualified to plant under the ForestEnvironment Protection Scheme(FEPS), which compensated him for theloss of REPS on the planted area. FEPSprovided an opportunity to design awoodland that will contribute more tothe landscape, biodiversity and promo-tion of native species, as well as pro-tecting the water resource of the Robe.

By organising most of the develop-ment works himself, while availing ofprofessionaladvice,Eugene feelshewasin more control of the cost and timing ofthe project. He also said he felt he could

Noneedtoseparatethewoolfro

EugeneMcCartan | Farmingand forestry stats

Total farm size 110 hectares

Area farmed 55 hectares

Woodland 55 hectares

Farming enterprise Sheep

Flock size 250

Breed Texel and Suffolk crosses

Woodland enterpriseMature woodland 20 hectares

New planting — 2001 to date* 35 hectares — 10 ha broadleaves; 25 ha

conifers

Christmas trees Planting 500 trees per year for next 7 years

Timber processing 200 tonnes/annum posts, planking, firewood

Woodcock shoots 1 to 2 per year

*A further 16 hectares are due to be planted by end 2010

22/4/1017:40


Today’s

farm

TheMcCartan family� farming sheep and trees for a secure future.

Leaving theirmark�Noel Kennedy,Teagasc forestry development officerand Eugene identifybroadleaf thinnings.

Thinning broadleaves� improves the final crop, provides income from the thinningsand boostsbiodiversity.

romthetrees

be sure of the quality of work. He thinksthatmore farmers should do some of thework themselves but only if they areprepared to commit the time and effortand to learn about trees as a crop.

Managing for a sustainable futureFarm woodlands must be actively man-aged to achieve their full potential anddevelop into a sustainable resource.Eugene has worked hard to ensure thatthis happens.

Thanks to active management andtimely thinning, the older woodlandsare healthy and vigorous, and provide asteady supply of timber to his farm-based sawmilling business.

With older woodlands ranging frommajestic oak, ash and beech to smallblocks of sitka spruce and alder/birchnative woodlands, Eugene is happy toacknowledge that the financial assis-tance provided by theWoodland Im-provement and NativeWoodlandSchemes have been a crucial support totheir management.

>> Next page

22/4/1017:40


forestryTo

day

’sfarm Eleven hectares of woodland are cur-

rently being managed under theWood-land Improvement Scheme inaccordance with the principles of Con-tinuous Cover Forest Management. CCFis the management and transformationof regular plantation forestry into per-manent, productive forest designed tobalance commercial production withlandscape, environmental and qualitybenefits; i.e. it eliminates the need toclearfell.

Highly enthusiastic about Continu-ous Cover forestry, Eugene has joinedPro-Silva Ireland, which advocates thissustainable management approachwhich is steadily gaining interest in thecountry.

Eugene feels strongly that farmersneed to ‘up their game’ when it comes tomanaging their woodlands if they wantto maximise their returns and make themost of their woodlands. In particular,they need to develop an income fromthinnings before the premia run out,and manage their crop to provide amore sustainable longer term income.He strongly supports the training andupskilling of farm foresters with an em-phasis on CCFmanagement.

To reflect this, Eugene has developeda close working relationship withTea-gasc and hosted part of aTeagasc/ForestService National Forestry establish-ment demonstration in 2008. Last year,he also demonstrated harvesting andtimber processing equipment at otherTeagasc national forestry events inMayo and Roscommon.

From seed to sawdustThe woodland cycle continues on Euge-ne’s farm at his sawmill. Using hardwoodand softwood timber felled on the farm,and some supplied from local farmers,the heart of this enterprise is aWoodmi-zer sawbench which produces plankingand square sawn posts for a variety ofuses.There is also a lot of work for hispost-peeler which produces fencingposts and strainers, mainly spruce thin-nings, to meet local demand.

Firewood is a rapidly expanding andprofitable market for Eugene.With in-creasing oil, gas and coal costs, the de-mand for quality seasoned firewood isgrowing. By processing his own timberand selling from the yard to a loyal cus-tomer base, Eugene is adding value to a‘home-grown’ product.

Seeing the wood from the treesAswell as premia and timber sales, Eu-gene lists other benefits from his wood-land activities:* Biodiversity�The woodlands arehome to awide range of birds, mammalsand insects where they find food, shel-ter, nesting sites and safety. Among therarer bird and mammal species presentare barn owls, Irish jays, woodcock, les-ser horseshoe bats and a peregrine fal-con. Bluebells and other woodlandplants are colonising the forest floor in

response to increased light followingthinning.* Shelter�The developing youngerwoodlands are complementing the shel-ter provided by the older trees � an im-portant factor in lamb survival rates.* Wood fuel�Eugene’s home is 100%heated by firewood, saving over €2,500annually.* Shoots�Part of the woodland isrented each year to a shooting syndicatefor woodcock shoots.*Carbon sequestration�Trees trapCO2and store carbon as timber while re-leasing oxygen. Eugene is hopeful thatthis woodland function will be rewardedby some sort of ‘green’ payment in thefuture.

What the future holdsEugene McCartan has a vision for hisbusiness and is determined that sheepwill play a significant part. Recent re-ductions to 250 Texel and Suffolk crossewes reflects not just a decrease inavailable grazing land, but also the startof his plan to establish amore pure-bredquality flock.

With more planting in the pipeline,

an eventual woodland cover of 70% isenvisaged at which Eugene believes theright economic and practical balancebetween his sheep and woodland enter-prises will have been achieved.

Having already facilitated the hold-ing of chainsaw courses on the farm forcasual employees and neighbours, he islooking forward to hosting more train-ing events.

Awoodland walk around the farm isbeing constructed and, in the longerterm, could form part of an eco-tourismenterprise.

As if that isn’t enough, Eugene wasrecently nominated to join the Stake-holder PartnershipTeam of theTeagascForestry Development Unit, where hisideas and suggestions can help shapethe unit’s effectiveness and business de-velopment.

Eugene McCartan has set himselfambitious goals: to farm top qualitysheep, manage top quality woodland,enhance the farm environment and,above all, to secure the future of his fa-mily.With his infectious enthusiasm,knowledge, skills and ambition, he is ona mission to succeed.

Ambitious goals�EugeneMcCartan

22/4/1017:42

horticulture


Today’s

farm

Home grown vegetables arebest�and cheapest!The ‘vegetable plot’, once

part and parcel of every

farm and garden, is

making a comeback

THEmemories of freshly pickedgarden peas and baby carrots,smothered in butter on thedinner plate, are still fresh in

mymind.Dinnersofyesteryear.With theadvent of affluence and conveniencefoods, people got out of the habit ofgrowing their own�until now. If there’sanything good to come out of this reces-sion it has to be the renewed interest ingrowing your own.

Growing vegetables can be a satisfy-ing and productive hobby and you can’tget fresher than home-grown foodstraight from the garden. It’s easy tosucceed, provided you followa few basicground rules.

To help you get started,Teagasc haveproducedAGuide toVegetableGrowing, ahandbook full of helpful tips and advice.It will encourage you to get your soilinto good shape, remove weeds regu-larly and take precautions against pestsand diseases.

Vegetables are usually grown fromseed; either direct drilled, where theyaretomature,orsownintoacontainer tobe transplanted out at a later date.

You can raise your own or buy intransplants from a garden centre ornursery.The latter option might be pre-ferable if you are a beginner.You have

the choice of growing your crops on theflat, on raised beds or in drills.

May is a busymonth for the vegetablegrower as seeds need to be sown andplants put out. Broad beans, peas, cab-bage, sprouts, cauliflowers, carrots andlettuce are just some of the crops thatcan be sown or planted now.Wait untilnext month before sowing French beansor sweet corn.

Once vegetables appear aboveground, or after transplanting, they arefair game for a whole host of potentialenemies. But don’t despair; take a fewsimple precautions and you can avoidmost problems.

I am not a great advocate of usingchemicals in the garden but the use ofsome well-timed slug pellets will save alot of grief; slugsand snails arepartial toa wide range of vegetables.

The other tip is to buy some fleece, alight woven plant cover, and cover allyour vegetables with it.This can be keptonuntil close toharvestandwillwardoffa variety pests including pigeons, carrotfly, cabbage root fly, green fly and cater-pillars. It’s light in weight and allows

light through, so it won’t harm thegrowth of your crop. If you are carefulnot to damage it, you can use your fleecea second time round.

Unless the soil is very fertile, it is ad-visable to apply some general purposefertilizer, raked in just before sowing orplanting. Make sure towater vegetablesduring dryweather, but especially whentheyare small; it’s important to get themproperly established.The inevitableweeds are best removed when they’reyoung and before they competewith thecrop. If you have followed all my in-structions and, with a little bit of luckwenowcome to thebest part�theharvest!

There is enormous satisfaction andno little pride to be had in picking yourvery first crop.The problem of gluts canbe overcome by careful planning, freez-ing the excess and becoming popularwith your neighbours.

Once bitten by the ‘growing bug’,you’ll find it hard to give it up.

* If you would like a free copy, pleasecontact Stephen Alexander at Teagasc,Kinsealy (01 8459048).

StephenAlexander,Teagasc,Co Dublin

Broadbeans, peas,

cabbage, sprouts,cauliflowers, carrotsandlettucearesomeofthe crops that can besownor planted now

22/4/1017:45


tillageTo

day

’sfarm Fungicides

fundamental

MANY farmers toyed with theidea of leaving land un-cropped for 2010.The finespell in the middle of April

was too tempting for almost all growersand the amount of uncropped land isminimal. It’s now up to all growers to getthe best return from these sown crops.

Fungicides play a major role in prof-itabilityandanaveragereturnofat leasttwo to two and half times the cost of thefungicide can be expected. I caught upwith a prominent tillage farmer and hisadviser in the south east to get theirviews and plans for fungicide inputs forthe season.

Tom Sheppard is growing a range ofwinter and spring crops onhis farmnearTullowthisyear.SpeakingtoTomandhisTeagasc adviser, Ciaran Hickey, thisspring,Tom outlined the challengeahead. ‘‘The potential returns fromwinterandspringcerealsare tightagainthis year and the worry about changingdiseasepopulationswillmakethisyearavery testing one,’’ said Tom.

Tom and Ciaran work closely throughthe year to manage a programme whichis both affordable and delivers optimumyields.

Research findingsTeagasc researchers found a new strainof septoria in 2008 which had reducedsensitivity in laboratory tests toprothioconazole (Proline) and, to a les-ser extent, epoxiconazole (e.g. OpusMax). More laboratory tests and fieldtrials in 2009 confirmed that this strainwas increasing (at some sites) in fre-quency.

Field trials information is limiteddue to the recent development of thenew strains. However, initial results in-

dicate that field performance ofprothioconazole and epoxiconazole ap-pear to have been affected where thisnewseptoria strain is prevalent in termsof immediate disease control and per-sistence of disease control.

Thenewstrainof septoria is sensitiveto tebuconazole (e.g. Folicur) and met-conazole (Caramba) so theseactivesmayhave a role in reducing the selectionpressure as well as ensuring good levelsof disease control. Generally speaking,metconazole is seen as a stronger sep-toria product than tebuconazole.Tea-gasc believes that high levels of diseasecontrol can still be achieved with se-quences of different triazoles appliedwith a suitablemixerpartner (e.g. Bravoor boscalid) or mixes of two differenttriazoles applied as pre-formulatedproducts (e.g. Gleam or Prosaro). Spraytiming and intervals between timingswill be critical to ensuring maximum ef-ficacy from products selected.

Table 1 highlights the best way toprotect yields and minimise the build-up of insensitive strains of septoriathrough the season in your crops.

Wheat at farm levelTeagasc adviser Ciaran Hickey believescontrol of septoria in the Carlow areawas relatively good last year but the re-

search findings from Oak Park must betaken very seriously at an individualgrower level this year.

Tom Sheppard, in consultation withCiaran,hasplannedoutastrategyforhiswheat which, they believe, will deliverhigh yields.Tom explain: ‘‘Einstein (notthe cleanest variety) has performedwellfor me over the last few years and I haveplanted it again this year hoping for si-milar results.The crop is sown after oatsand Iplan to useOpus Star 1.5 L/ha plusBravo 1.0 L/ha as the first fungicide. Allgoing well Iwill follow withVenture Ex-tra 1.0 L/ha plus Rubric 0.4 L/ha andBravo 1.0 L/ha as the flag leaf applica-tion. Rubric, a generic Opus, workedwell for me last year and I have no pro-blemadding it to themixagain this year.However, I hope Boscolid, containedwithinVenture, will add additionalgreeningpotentialwhichshouldconvertinto yield.

‘‘Finally, I plan to use Gleam 1.5 L/hato 2.0 L/ha as my final ear wash spray.This mix of Opus and Caramba shouldcontain septoria populations and itworked well for me last year.’’

Ciaran said that this programmemaychange depending on the timings andthe septoria pressure present.Tom wasquick to point out that the programmeshould come in under budget at some-

Planning yourbarley

fungicide strategyshould start early sothat products can bepurchasedontimeandat a lower cost

MichaelHennessy,TeagascOak Park

Ciaran Hickeyand farmersTomand Liam Sheppard.

22/4/1017:45


Today’s

farm

where between €50 and €55 per acre.

Spring barleyPlanning your barley fungicide strategyshould start early so that products canbepurchasedontimeandata lowercost.Generally, two fungicide applicationsare needed to keep disease at bay.Vari-eties with good disease resistance, suchas Quench or Magaly, can lend them-selves to a low fungicide strategy; e.g.reduced rates at both timings. Keep aclose eye on Azalea and Cocktail for netblotch at an early stage.

The first fungicide can be appliedfrommid to late tillering but should beapplied before first node detectablestage.

Half-rates are generally sufficient.Products likeProline (prothioconazole),PunchC, Lyric, Stereo, etc, will all do anexcellent job at this stage.Whererhyncho is a problem early, use Prolineat a higher rate (50% to 60% rate ofprothioconazole), as it has the best ac-tivity of the products mentioned.

Likewise, where net blotch is a pro-blem, use higher rates of Proline.Theaddition of strobilurins (Modem, Gali-leo, etc) may also be justified.

The second fungicide application(T2) will coincide with the flag leafemerged to awns visible.Triazoles form

the cornerstone of disease control at theT2 timing with products containingprothioconazole featuring strongly.Other alternatives can be used such asVenture Extra, Allegro Plus or triazolesplus strobilurin mixes such as AmistarOpti, Credo, etc.

Tom Sheppard planted Snakebiteagain thisyear.‘‘Idelivered three tonnesper acre from Snakebite last year butdisease crept in towards the middle ofthe season,’’ he said.

Ciaran Hickey explained that thecrop stood extremely well up to harvestbut the variety needed a close eye forrhyncho through the year.

Tom pointed out that his fungicideplan for Snakebite will be based aroundprothioconazole this year as he is con-cerned about rhyncho.

Tom said: ‘‘I have already orderedProline. Iwill apply0.3 to0.4L/habeforethe first node and follow with Fandangoat1.0 to1.25L/haplusBravo1.0L/ha justas the awns are peeping.’’

Tom admits that this programme isnot cheap (somewhere around €30/ac)but hewill use a cheaper (generic) basedprogramme on the cleaner varietyQuench.

OatsWinter and spring oat disease control is

quite similar as the same varieties areused at both timings.

All varieties are very susceptible tomildew and this disease predominatesevery season. Other diseases such ascrown rust (mostly in southern counties)and red leather leaf can be a problem inmany crops. Oats in 2010 have comethroughthewinterquitecleanwith littleor no mildew. However, red leather leafdisease develop in April on many crops.

A good fungicide programme at thestart of the season should start withpreventative control of mildew. Manygrowers used Talius where crops werevery clean but others used Tocata orBeamwhere red leather leaf was also aproblem.

The next main fungicide applicationwill coincide with the main growth reg-ulator at second node (GS32). Productsof choice at this timing will contain atriazole, plus a mildewcide. ProductslikeTocata 1.0-1.5L/ha or Beam 1.0 L-1.5L/ha, etc.

The final fungicide applicationshould be timed at the ears emergingstage.The addition of a strobilurin atthis stageshouldhelp tomaintaincolourin the grain which is especially impor-tant for the horse market. Productswhich fit well at this stage include Jen-ton,Tocata, Beam plus Amistar, etc.

Table1 | Base suggested fungicide programme 2010 for septoria control in wheat

Spray Suggested chemical strategy Examples of product which cantiming for septoria control be used at these timingsT1 Triazole (Group 1) + Bravo/boscalid Opus Max/Proline + Bravo or

Venture Extra

T2 Triazole (Group 1 ± Group 2) Opus Max/Proline/Gleam/Prosaro

+ Bravo/boscalid + Bravo or Venture Extra

T3 Triazole (Group 1 + Group 2) Gleam/Prosaro/Folicur/Caramba

or Triazole Group 2

Where Venture Extra is used at a timing, chlorothalonil (Bravo) may be omitted. Additional actives

may be needed for other diseases

Triazoles: Group 1: Epoxiconazole; Prothioconazole

Group 2: Tebuconazole; Metconazole

Triazole grouping is based on sensitivity to various septoria strains

Septoria remains the key challenge inwheat.

22/4/1017:12


farmmanagementTo

day

’sfarm

Planning forretirementAnd farm transfer

MOST farmland in Ireland istransferred to the next gen-eration through gift and in-heritance; only a tiny

amount of land transfer results fromsales on the open market. Retirementbrings big changes in lifestyle and in-come levels and should be planned for.This article addresses themain issues tobeconsidered inretirementplanningbyfarmers.The main tax issues in relationto farm transfer will be examined in afuture edition of Today’s farm.

Ensuring adequateincome during retirementPeopleare living longerandwillneedanincome which allows an acceptablestandard of living. Medical and nursinghome costs are increasing faster thangeneral inflation and these can becomemajor costs in later years.

Farmers need to plan early for theirretirement and should consider the fol-lowing potential income sources to helpfund it:* Farm retirement and Installation Aidschemes (suspended since 14 October2008).The Early Retirement Scheme (ERS 3� 2007 to 2013) provided for an annualpension of up to €15,000 for eligiblefarmers over the age of 55 years and forup to 10 years.

About2,500 farmerswhoqualified forthis and the earlier scheme after 2000are still receiving pensions, with totalpayments of approximately €40 millionbeing paid in 2010.

TheYoung Farmer’s InstallationScheme (YFIS) provided a grant of€15,000 for qualified young farmers un-der35years of agegettingestablished infarming.

Both these schemesworking togetherwere very useful in allowing farmers toretire earlier than the old age pensionage of 66 years, and allowed young

farmers to get established in farming atan earlier age.

Unfortunately, both schemes remainsuspended by the Government since 14October 2008 due to budget pressuresand we do not know if they will be re-opened between now and 2013.Thismeans that most farmers cannot nowretire until 66, when the old age pensionbecomespayable,unless theyhaveotherincome sources.* The State contributory pensionThis is the Old Age Contributory Pen-sion which is payable from the age of 66.Most farmers are self-employed and payClass S PRSI. Check with your accoun-tant and the Department of Social Pro-tection about your level of PRSIcontributions and the level of pensionyou can expect at age 66.

The contributory old age pension ismodest at about one third of the averageindustrial wage.The rates from 1 Janu-ary 2010 are:�Max personal rate = €230.30/week(€11,975/year)� Person with qualified adult under 66years = €383.80/week (€19,957/year)� Person with qualified adult over 66years = €436.60 (€22,703/year)

The farmer’s spouse/partner is thequalified adult and this allowance ismeans tested.The full allowance is pay-able where the income of the qualifiedadult is under €100/week but declinesgradually as other income rises to €300/week and is not paid above this. Somefarm spouses in farm partnerships, andmaking their own PRSI contributions,can qualify for a pension in their ownright rather than getting the qualifiedadult allowance.

Other farm spouses whowork full orpart-time off farm will be paying theirown PRSI. Farmers approaching 66should fill out a form and return it withsupporting documentation three to sixmonths before pension age to: Old AgeContributions Section, Pensions Ser-vices Office, College Road, Sligo,Tel:071-9169800, or LoCall 1890-500-000.

The recently launched NationalPensions Framework proposes that thequalifying age for old age pensions willincrease to 67 in 2021 and to 68 in 2028;middle aged/younger farmers need to

John Norris,FarmManagementSpecialist,TeagascKildalton

22/4/1017:12


Today’s

farm

take this into account. Farmers who failto qualify for the State contributorypension can apply for a means testedpension which is lower and takes intoaccount other income and assets.* Private and occupational pensionsSome farmers have invested in privatepension funds which can provide an in-come top-up to the old age pension.These pension funds suffered a drop ofabout one third in value in 2008buthavebeen recovering in 2009/2010.

There is good tax relief on pensioncontributions for high rate taxpayersbut lower farm incomes in2008and2009have reduced the potential to invest.Farmers comingupto retirement shouldget advice on the various options theyhave to utilise their pension funds.

Farmer spouses whowork off farm inteaching, nursing andother occupationswill be eligible for their own occupa-tional pensions.* Savings and investmentsSome farmers can top-up their retire-ment incomewith interest from savings,rent/lease income from property anddividends from shares. However, the re-cession has badly hit property andshares, and interest rates on savings aremodest. Some of the capital can also beused towards living costs but it will notlast long unless there are good reservesto begin with.* Land lease/rental incomeSome farmers may have no direct suc-cessors or their children may not beready to take over the farm.Thesefarmers can generate income fromrenting/leasing out the land and EUen-titlements.There is a tax advantage tolonger term leases to non-related per-sons at market value.The landownermust be over 40 years old when leasingout the land.The following amounts oflease income are tax free, depending onlease duration:� five or six years: up to €12,000/year� seven years and under 10 years: up to€15,000/year� 10-year lease or longer; up to €20,000/year.

Leases within the family and rentalagreements under five years do notqualify for tax relief.

Farmers who plan to sell or gift landlater should check the capital gains taximplications with their accountant be-fore renting/leasing out the land.

Where farms are large, the retiringfarmer may retain some of the land forlife as a source of security and lease it tothe successor to generate supplemen-tary income. It can then be transferredafter death as an inheritance to the suc-cessor or another family member.* Sale of sites/landSome farmersmaywish to retain sites ora valuable piece of land which can besold now or later and provide extra se-curity/cash lump.

>> Next page

22/4/1017:12


farmmanagementTo

day

’sfarm After the age of 55, a farmer can dispose

of land up to €750,000 lifetime limit tonon-related persons and claim retire-ment relief for capital gains tax, pro-vided it was owned and farmed for 10years or longer immediately prior todisposal. Prices and demand for sitesare depressed at present, but, hopefully,will recover as the economy recovers.

There is a nowawindfall 80% capitalgains tax on the sale of developmentland introduced under the recentNAMA legislation. It applies to dispo-sals of land on/after 30 October 2009where the land has been re-zoned sincethat date. It alsoprovides thatthe sale ofonce-off sites under an acre and valuedat less than €250,000, are not subject tothe windfall tax. It is not yet clear if theexemption applies to one site or multi-ple sites; get advice on this. Land dis-posed of byCompulsoryPurchaseOrder(CPO) is exempt from the 80% windfallCGT� but is subject to normal CGTrules.

What to do in retirement?Retiring is a big step and farmers needto gear up for this by developing othersuitable activities and leisure interestsin good time before expected retire-ment. Many farmers continue to have aninterest in the farm transferred and canhelp the successor in times of need.

Some retired farmers may continueto work on the successor’s farm as anemployee part-timewhile their physicalhealth is goodand earn apartialwage tosupplement income. Discuss this withyour accountant. Other farmers mayhave suitable part-timeworkoff-farm ordevelop a small alternative enterprise.

Medical cards and GP cardsRetired farmers under the age of 70 willfind it difficult to qualify for a medicalcard except in exceptional circum-stances. It is easier to qualify for a GP(family doctor) visit card as the incomelimits are 25% higher than for the med-ical card. It will also be easier to qualifyformedical cardswhenover70yearsasasinglepersoncanhaveagross incomeupto €700/week and a married couple€1,400/week since January 2009.

For more details, contact the Com-munity Care Section of your local HSE.Where possible, retired people shouldtry and maintain health insurancewhere theyalreadyhave itandnotbreaktheir contributions record.

Nursing home costsAs people live longer, there is a higherchance theymayhave to spend time in anursing home, which will involve sub-stantial costs.

A new Nursing Home SupportScheme (The Fair Deal Legislation)came into effect on 27 October 2009. Itreplaces the Subvention Scheme whichhad been in place since 1993. A person’sincome and assets are subject to a de-tailedexamination todecideon the level

of contribution which they must maketowards the costs.

It is importantthat farmers areawarethat there is a five-year ‘look back’ ruleat assets, including the farm, trans-ferred up to five years before entry to anursing home, and these are included inthe calculations. A three-year cap oncontributions may apply to farms andbusinesses in certain limited circum-stances and subject to a number of strictrules. As the scheme is new, variousareas need to be further clarified. Moredetails are available from the HSE (Lo-Call 1850-24-1850) or on the websitewww.hse.ie

Extraadvice isessentialbefore fillingout application forms for assessment.

The farm dwellingSome farmers will retain ownership ofthe farmdwellinghouse forlifewhen thefarm is transferred, or they will retainrights of residence for life. In othercases, the retiring parents may build anew house or purchase an existinghouse. Plan for this in good time and getadvice from your solicitor on rights ofresidence, maintenance payments fromthe farm and related issues.

The successorThe successor will be identified alreadyon most farms but, if not done, it is im-portant to do it in good time so that thesuccessor can plan accordingly.The

successor needs to have his/her agricul-tural education completed to avail ofstamp duty and other incentives foryoung trained farmers.

Most importantly, the successorneeds toensure thathewillhaveaviableongoing income when he takes over thefarm. He should not be overburdenedwith debt due to family settlements orexcessive lease or support payments toparents relative to the income gener-atedbythe farm.Themain tax issueswillbe examined in a future article.

Many farmers continue to have an interest in the farm transferredand can help the successor intimes of need but, remember, farmers in the EURetirement Schemearenot allowed toworkon thefarm.

RETIREMENT | key points

* Retirement is a big life change andmust be planned for.Howwill the freetimeinretirementbeused?Anadequateincomemust be provided for.Check thepotential income from the oldagepen-sionandprivatepensionsandalsoothersources like investment income, leaseincome, part-timeemployment anduseof savings.* As people get older, theyare prone tosuffermore illness andmayneed nur-sing home care. Issues like health in-surance, medical cards and nursinghome costs need to be addressed* Theyoungsuccessor, onceidentified,needs to complete agricultural educa-tion andget ready to take over the farm.

22/4/1017:46

environment


Today’s

farm

Sky dancing

Afarmer recentlytoldmeaboutan amazing sight he had ob-served� strange ritual beha-viour by a medium sized bird

of prey in the skyon abright dryday.Thefarmer is one of 320 involved in the Na-tional Parks andWildlife Service FarmPlan Scheme for Hen Harrier. I dis-cussed the remarkable behaviour of theHenHarrier during thebreeding seasonfromMarch to September with BarryO’Donoghue, NPWS.

Sky dancing is one of the most spec-tacular things in all of nature.

In this courtship display, the maleshows off his skill, agility, stamina andprowess in a mind-blowing series of‘loops’.This entails soaring to greatheights and speeding to within feet ofthe ground in a flurry of corkscrews,wind flapping somersaults, twists andturns,beforerisingagaintocontinuetheritual for up to 15 minutes at a time!

‘Dance-offs’Twomales can engage in ‘dance-offs’.Females may also take part. Courtshipdisplays can occur from late March tolateMay.HenHarriers in flight typicallyglide with wings held in a shallow ‘v’,with occasional flaps. A hunting harrierhuntswithin fivemetresof thegroundorvegetation, often doubling back on aparticular area. A harrier carrying preyflies higher on a direct and purposefulflight.

Food passAnother amazing characteristic of theHen Harrier is the food pass from the

PICTURE:Barry O’Donoghue,NPWS

CatherineKeena,Teagasc Kildalton

Don’t miss out onnew Agri-Environment Options Scheme*With REPS4 closed to new applicants, anew Agri-Environment Options Scheme(AEOS) is now available to farmers notinvolved in REPS on 17 May 2010, theNational Parks and Wildlife Farm PlanScheme or the new Burren Scheme.* The closing date is 17 May.*Funding is available at the rate of €5,000per farm per year for up to 10,000 ap-plicants who join for five years.*Actions may be chosen for which the totalannual payment is less than €5,000.* There is no guaranteed entry, except for

farms with SACs, SPAs or commonage. ASustainable Management Plan must bedrawn up by a planner for such farms.* The whole farm is not involved. Actionsare chosen for specific areas. Apart fromnormal cross compliance standards, thereare no further requirements on the re-mainder of the farm.* Eighteen actions are available involvingextensive grassland, tillage, hedgerows,trees, watercourses, stone walls, wild birdcover, rare breeds and traditional orchards.* At least two actions must be chosen.

* Extra actions above the minimum tworequired may be chosen which mayincrease the chance of gaining entry to thescheme.*There is no limit to the extent of any actionundertaken, except the traditional orchard,which is limited to one per farm.* For more information seehttp://www.agriculture.gov.ie/farmerschemespayments/ruralenvironmentprotectionschemereps/repsandaeosschemes/aeosscheme/* Contact your local Teagasc office.

male to the female.The male, carryingprey in his talons, will call to the femaleas he approaches the nest area.The fe-male will rise to meet the male and, asshe comes near him, she somersaultsupside down,while he drops the prey forher to catch in her talons.

The male and female are so differentin sizeandcolour that formanyyears thetwowere thought to be separate species.The male Hen Harrier is a white birdwith broad black tips to the wings,sometimes known as the white hawk.

The female is larger than the maleand is brownwith awhite rump.Femaleshave attractive under-wing patterns,with bars running through the feathers.

Watch out for Hen HarriersHen Harriers hunt for small birds andmammals over moorland, hill farmlandand young conifer plantation.They re-quire open areas, particularly farmedhill pastures.

Without grazing, vegetation becomestoo rank for them to hunt.

Important areas are: Slieve BloomMountains inLaois andOffaly; Stack’s toMullaghareirk Mountains in Cork; Slie-vefelim to Silvermines in Limerick andTipperary; Slieve Beagh in Monaghan;andSlieveAughties inClareandGalway.If in these areas, watch out for thesemagnificent sights.

The female Hen Harrier who is largerthan themale is brownwith adistinguishingwhite rump.Femaleshaveattractive under-wing patterns, withbars running through the feathers.

22/4/1017:47


catchmentsTo

day

’sfarm

The Agricultural

Catchments Programme

(ACP) is working to

benefit farmers and

the environment

GerShortle ACPprogrammemanager

WHEN farmersgethighplantuptake from the nutrientsthey spread in manuresandfertilizers, theygetthe

best financial return.The nutrients arebeing used to produce more of what thefarmer wants � be it grass, grain, root-crops, etc � and the nutrients can’t belost from the soil to surface or ground-water if they are taken up by the crop.

The Agricultural Catchments Pro-gramme (ACP) is an integrated advi-sory/research programme that isworking in co-operation with farmers insix catchments around Ireland to im-prove our understanding of the fate ofnutrients applied on farms.The aim is abetter scenario forboth farmers and theenvironment.

DangersFertilizer being ‘lost’ is the worst out-come for farmers and the environment.Nutrients getting into water have thepotential to cause nutrient enrichmentand ecological problems. Meanwhile,farmers are obliged to spend more onfertilizer to meet crop requirements.The two nutrients that are of most con-cern are nitrogen (N) and phosphorus

(P).The amount of bothNandP that canbe spread is now restricted under GoodAgricultural Practice measures, andthey represent substantial input costson most farms� good reasons to usethem as efficiently as possible.

Researchers around the world aredevoting substantial time and resourcestowards understanding how nutrientscan best be kept on the farm, limitingpotential losses to water.

Small amounts from nutrientsources, such as fertilizers,manures andsoil reserves, can be mobilised due tonatural processes, such as erosion orleaching.The nutrients find their wayinto pathways through which watermoves, either on the surface or throughthe soil, subsoil or in the bedrock.Thesenutrients are delivered to water bodiessuch as rivers or lakes, where the watermay become nutrient-enriched, affect-ing the ecology of the water body.

Setting up the catchmentsThe ACPaims to improve understand-ingofhowthisprocessworksunder Irishconditions. Six catchments have beenestablished across a range of soils typesand farming systems.The catchmentswere carefully selected after rigoroussearching using a computer-based geo-graphic information system, as well ason-the-ground judgement and localknowledge.

Each catchment had to meet a rangeof criteria, including soil type, farmingintensity, enterprise mix and practicalsuitability for carrying out measure-ments on the catchment stream.

Thegoodwill andparticipation of thefarmers is the most important factor inestablishing a catchment and achievinggood results from the programme.Thefirst step in theprocesswas tomeet eachfarmer in the catchment individually.

This job was carried out by the advi-sers working as part of the ACP team.They explain what the programme isabout, and its importance for the futureof Irish farming. In all six catchments,the support and participation of thefarmers has been excellent.

Achieving the balanceThekeyto goodnutrientmanagement isachieving a balance between the re-quirements of the crop being grown andthe supply of nutrient available in thesoil.There’s an increased risk of losswhere levels of nutrients in the soil aregreater than the crop’s needs.

These nutrients cost money to putthere in the first place, and may be anunnecessary cost on the farm business.On theotherhand, if soil nutrient supplyis less than crop requirement, yieldmaybe reduced, potentially causing a re-duction in farm income.

Step one in getting the balance right

ACP | what is it?

* Researchisneededtohelpensurethatwe can continue to produce good foodefficientlyand profitably in away thatdoesn’t damage the environment.Wealsoneed tomonitorand evaluate themeasures in the Nitrates Action Pro-gramme (NAP) to comply with the Ni-trates Directive.* The Agricultural Catchements Pro-grammewas set up to do this researchand evaluation.The Programme de-pendson the co-operationof farmers insix catchments anda broad rangeofdata is being collected on production,financial and nutrient management is-sues to showhow farmers are ‘doingtheir bit’ for water quality by complyingwith GAPmeasures.

Don’twatchyourfertiliz

22/4/1017:51


Today’s

farm

lizergodownthedrain

is finding out the nutrient status of thesoil.TheACPisconductingdetailedsoil-testing in the catchments to establishsoil nutrient levels for each field or sub-division of larger fields.The results arebeing returned to farmers with nutrientrecommendations and nutrient man-agement plans where appropriate.

Participating farmers are keepingrecords of fertilizer and manure appli-cations, which will be very useful in de-veloping nutrient balances at field, farmand catchment level.

An index systemwith four categories� very low (1), low (2), medium (3) andhigh (4) � is used to categorise soils ac-cording to their concentrations of PandK.These give an indication of the re-

sponse to applied fertilizer � definite,likely, unlikely and none respectively.

The soil analysis results from thecatchments are beginning to reveal thedistribution of P and K concentrationsacross the catchments.There is varia-tion in soil nutrient levels across catch-ments and within farms.

In many cases, there is an obviousimbalance in thewaythatnutrientshavebeen applied in the past, leading to alegacy of high nutrient levels in somefields and low levels in others.

For P this is particularly significant,as it may take many years for high P le-vels to decrease in the soil, despitefarmers changing their managementand not applying P to these fields.

Changes are likely to be particularlyslow if P offtakes are low� e.g. on moreextensively stocked farms or on soilsthat have a high potential to retain P.

ACP adviserTom O’Connell worksclosely with farmers in the Dunleercatchment in Co Louth to optimise nu-trient management. Good records offertilizer and manure applications areessential for both good farmmanage-ment and theACP researchprogramme.

Pat and Michael Callan, who bothfarm near Dunleer, are two of Tom’s cli-ents who are keeping nutrient applica-tion records as part of the programme.

With the co-operation of tillagefarmers in two of the catchments, three

phosphorus and potassium (K) responsetrials have been set up by ACP re-searcher David Wall and tillage specia-list Mark Plunkett.

These on-farm trials encompass arange of soil types and P and K levels:two trials are taking place on springbarley in the free-draining Castledock-erell catchment, and there is one trial onwinter wheat in the Dunleer catchmentwhere the soil is less well drained.

ACP adviser Eddie Burgess works inthe twoWexford catchments. One of hisclients, tillage farmer JamesMasterson,who farms near Castledockerell, hasprovided a site for one of the trials. Likemost farmers in the area, James is keento see the outcome of these trials, asphosphorus fertilizer is a substantialcost in spring barley production.

The aim of these response trials is toestablish economic optimum Pand Kfertilizer rates specific to the crops, soiltypes and the levels of background nu-trients available.

Results from these trials will help toimprove the understanding of how cer-eal crops and soil reserves respond tovarying levels of applied P and K andconsequently help improve the nutrientrecommendations advisers give tofarmers.

The ACP programme will include si-milar trials on grassland sites as timeand resources allow.

ABOVE:TomO’Connell,ACPofficer, with neighbours Pat Callan and Michael Callanwho farmnearDunleer.

LEFT:Eddie Burgess and Per-Erik Mellander discuss crop establishment withWexford farmerJamesMasterson.

Results fromthese trials will

help to improve theunderstanding of howcereal crops and soilsreserves respond tovarying levels ofapplied Pand K

22/4/1018:00


botanic gardensTo

day

’sfarm Watering

plantsWhy toomuch cankill

WITHOUTwater, plants die.Meeting this basic needshould be simple andstraightforward.Why,

then, are so many more plants killed byover-watering compared with underwatering?Watering is actuallyoneof themost skilled jobs any horticulturist orgardener can be asked to perform.

You may wonder why? To appreciateall the elements involved in decidinghowmuch and how often plants requirewateringnecessitatesanumberofmajordecisions by the person applying thewater.

Only 2% of the water that plants takeup is needed for healthy growth; theylose theother98%.This isbecausewatermoving inside the plant helps to cool itdown and to transport important plantnutrients from the growingmedium intothe plant.

Evaporation of water from the leafsurface is influenced by temperature,wind and humidity. If you think howquickly or slowly clothes dry on a lineunder different temperature regimes,wind speeds and humidity levels, it willgive you an idea of howquicklyor slowlywater is lost from the surface of a plant.

The ability of a root system to inter-cept rainfall or irrigation varies signifi-cantly, depending on whether the plantis growing in the ground or in a contain-er. Plants growing in open space haveextensive root systems and can abstract

water many metres away from the mainstem. However, plants in pots or con-tainershavearestrictedroot systemanda canopy which may deflect water fromreaching the pot.

Ultimately, the plant depends on suf-ficient water being supplied by thegrower, especially indoors. A bathroomsponge is a good approximation of howthe soil holds water. Soak a sponge in abasin of water, expel all the air and thenlift itoutof thebasin.Waterwill leave thesponge bythe force of gravity.Thiswateris lost in reality through the drainageholes in the pots.The spaces vacated bywater draining due to gravity are re-placed immediately with air.The re-maining water in the sponge is eitheravailable or unavailable water and isvisible as a saturated zone in the sponge.

The available water can easily besqueezed from the sponge by applyingpressure but the unavailable water can-

not be extracted from the sponge and, inthe same way, the soil can contain waterwhich is not available to the plant roots.

Growingmedia (peat, soil, sand, bark,various mixes) mirror the sponge modelconcept and have different water hold-ing capacities which influences theamount of water required and the fre-quency of application.

The height of the pot or containeralso influences the amount of water lostby gravity.Tall pots will have a greaterhead of pressure and lose more waterthan dwarf pots of the same capacityand, as such, will be more forgiving be-cause the saturated zone will be lowerdown in the pot compared with a dwarfpot.

What perplexes me most aboutwatering is when people leave plantssitting on saucers full of drainage water.How do they expect the roots to survivewithoutair?Couldyou imagine standingbarefoot in cold water for hours on end,particularly in periods of lower tem-peratures? It would not be a nice ex-perience for either the person or theplant.This approach to watering is re-sponsible for most of the losses due toover-watering, particularly in spring,autumn and winter.

A far safer method is to water theplant from below when it is placed on asaucer containing either fine sand or apiece of cloth. Apply sufficient water tojust cover the sandor clothandallow thegrowing medium to suck the water in.Replace water used by the plant andevaporated from sand or cloth as re-quired.

This approach will result in far fewerplant ‘casualties’.

An occasional series by expertsat theTeagasc college at

the National Botanic gardensaimed at adding to the

appearance and value ofyour farm

Asafemethod towater the plant frombelow involves placing it on a saucer containing either finesandora piece of cloth.

Harold Lawlor,Teagasc

Only 2%ofthewater that

plants take up isneeded for healthygrowth; they lose theother 98%

FBD Insurance plc is regulated by the Financial Regulator

Here are just some of the initiatives we support:

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No insurer is more involved in the Irish farming community than FBD

today's farm may-jun 2010

Documents

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