Farmer Focus: Cathal Irwin’s suckler to store system in Castlebar, Co. Mayo

Future Beef programme participant Cathal Irwin from Co. Mayo is on this week’s Beef Edge podcast to give an insight into grassland management on his farm this spring and planning ahead for silage 2022. Cathal operates a suckler to store system in Castlebar and farms just over 18 ha of predominantly heavy land. Cows calve in December and January so that the calves can thrive at grass when they hit the grass in April. Weanlings currently average 450/kg and have achieved 0.98kg per day since birth. Depending on the weather this week, Cathal plans on letting store cattle to grass this weekend or next depending on ground conditions. He plans to graze driest most recently reseeded paddocks then go with 30 units of urea or 2000 gallons of slurry to the acre (LESS) depending on ground conditions. Soil samples indicated lime is not too bad with most of the clay soils around 6.3 and peat soils 5.3. Phosphorus is index 3 or 4 and Potassium is index 1 or 2. Cathal plans to close up 16 acres for two cut silage system. In 2015 he put in a paddock system and has never looked back. Every paddock has access to a water trough with current paddock size around 1.6 to 2 acres and he would typically graze all store bullocks and cows and calves in one bunch. Teagasc is hosting a series of spring walks this spring and you can find your local walk here: https://www.teagasc.ie/news--events/daily/beef/spring-beef-grass-walks-2022.php You can complete a fodder budget for your farm for winter 2022 here: https://www.teagasc.ie/media/website/publications/2018/Fodder-Plan-18.pdf For more episodes from the Beef Edge, visit the show page at: https://www.teagasc.ie/thebeefedge Produced on behalf of Teagasc by LastCastMedia.com