The Dairy Edge

John Maher, Manager of the Teagasc Grass10 Programme joins Stuart Childs to discuss the grass growing year of 2024 and what we can learn from it for 2025. John discusses several elements that people can control to help drive grass growth on their farms.  Getting the basics right is what makes the difference. Soil fertility has always been important but it is more important still where nitrogen is reduced as has been the case in the last number of years. Grazing infrastructure to get grass to cows but not damage ground, was a significant issue for farmers in 2024. This doesn’t have to be elaborate, it may just be a few extra gaps into paddocks. John went on to say that a big challenge for farmers to address in 2025 is replenishing feed reserves. While the extended autumn in 2024 has helped, people need to plan to increase feed stocks in anticipation of the weather challenges that are becoming more frequent.  This means farmers need to do a root and branch review of their farming system and establish how they will deal with one of these weather challenges when it comes again. This means looking at how to increase grass growth on the farm, is the stocking rate appropriate, a plan for quality silage etc. Finally, John outlines the fertiliser plan for early 2025 and how it is important to get nitrogen out in the form of either slurry or chemical nitrogen early to get growth going. It’s only a low rate application and it should only be spread in appropriate conditions but it needs to be spread if the weather is right to stimulate growth. For more episodes from the Dairy Edge podcast go to the show page at:https://www.teagasc.ie/animals/dairy/the-dairy-edge-podcast/ The Dairy Edge is a co-production with LastCastMedia.com

For the final Grass10 grazing management update of 2024, Joseph Dunphy discusses the 2024 grazing year with Ciaran Hearn from PastureBase Ireland, plus find out how to make better use of your grazing data through the reports on PastureBase Ireland. Here also is the link to the Grass10 end of year webinar:https://bit.ly/Grass10WebinarRecording For more episodes from the Dairy Edge podcast go to the show page at:https://www.teagasc.ie/animals/dairy/the-dairy-edge-podcast/ The Dairy Edge is a co-production with LastCastMedia.com

For this week’s Grass10 grazing management update, now that we are in early December, Joseph Dunphy discusses completing your closing Average Farm Cover on PastureBase Ireland along with an up to date set of soil samples. Plus, this week’s featured farmer is Sustainable Grassland Farmer of the Year for 2023, Patrick O’Neill from Co. Longford. Link to this week’s Grass10 newsletter: https://bit.ly/Grass10-10thDecember For more episodes from the Dairy Edge podcast go to the show page at:https://www.teagasc.ie/animals/dairy/the-dairy-edge-podcast/ The Dairy Edge is a co-production with LastCastMedia.com

This week on the Dairy Edge, we continue our coverage from the Teagasc National Dairy Conference in Limerick.  The theme of this year’s conference was Robust Dairy Farming for Future Challenges. As part of the conference there were six practical workshops which farmers could choose to attend which would benefit their own farms in the future.  These included:•             Meeting Herd feed requirements next spring•             Successful use of sexed semen in Irish dairy herds•             Controlling dairy production costs in 2025•             Managing young calves for better health outcomes•             Clover 150 – lessons learned from 2024 and putting a plan in place for 2025•             Trends in TB, reducing risk for dairy herds    We hear from the presenters from each of the workshops who outline some of the key messages discussed on the day. For more episodes from the Dairy Edge podcast go to the show page at:https://www.teagasc.ie/animals/dairy/the-dairy-edge-podcast/ The Dairy Edge is a co-production with LastCastMedia.com