It’s ‘all systems go’ with regards to grazing on the Advantage Beef Programme (ABP) Demo Farm, as the spring-born calves bought in 2021 are currently out for their second season grazing.
The first group of cattle went out to grass on February 26, and the last of the yearling cattle went out to grass on Friday, March 25.
There are a total of just over 400 cattle on the farm, both heifers and steers, all of which are calves originating from the dairy herd from a range of sire breeds.
The aim is to have all of these 2021-born cattle finished before the 2022-born calves are housed this autumn
Weather conditions proved tricky at first, with heavy rain in the early days of March leaving ground conditions soft thus making it tougher to achieve good graze-outs.
The average date cattle went to grass was approximately March 15.
There was some level of poaching but ground has since recovered okay. To avoid high levels of poaching during the wet spell, cattle were moved on to new paddocks before full graze-outs were achieved and then returned to these paddocks at a later date, when ground conditions had improved.
On the ABP Demo Farm, when cattle go to grass, sheds are cleaned out, disinfected, bedded and calves then arrive into these sheds. Because of this, the farm needs to be sure that when cattle go to grass, they can remain out.
Grazing plan
Grazing starts with cattle in smaller batches of 30 or so, and then batches are made larger as weather improves.
Normally, cattle graze in batches of 40 or 50 on the farm however, this year, the farm has plans to graze fewer batches with larger numbers of cattle.
Graze-outs being achieved on the farm currently (see photos below).
It is hoped that batches of 80-100 yearlings will be assembled this year and that doing this will reduce the paddock graze-out time from three days, to one day.
Previously, batches of 40-50 cattle were grazing-out paddocks in three days. However, the opinion on the farm is that better weight-gain could be achieved with a one-day graze out and cattle getting fresh grass every day or every second day.
By mid-summer, the farm generally has eight groups of yearlings and four to five groups of calves at grass.
This means there are 12-13 groups of cattle on the farm, which can prove challenging to manage effectively.
This year, the farm plans to run the four main groups of yearling cattle and one group of smaller yearling cattle, reducing the amount of fences to be moved every day.
By increasing the group sizes and reducing the number of groups, it is hoped to ease management while also improving performance.
Approximately 40% of the 280ac farm had been grazed by the end of March.
Grazing began on the 70ac block that will be closed for silage. From this 70ac block, as well as the farm’s red clover paddocks and surplus paddocks that are taken out as bales, the farm aims to secure 1,400 silage bales to meet its winter feed requirement.
ABP Demo Farm’s target weights
The target weight for cattle going to grass for their second season is 350kg.
Cattle are weighed monthly and the motto on the farm with regards data recording is: “If you don’t measure, you can’t manage. It’s like driving a tractor without a fuel gauge”.
The monthly weighing for March recorded an average weight of 346kg for the heifers and 358kg for the bullocks, with an overall average of 351kg -which is just slightly above the target weight.
Most of the yearlings are February-born on the ABP Demo Farm, with just a few March-born calves and no April-born calves on the farm.
Before going to grass, cattle were being fed 2kg of concentrates and 2kg of beet as part of a Total Mixed Ration (TMR).
After Christmas, meal and beet was gradually reduced in the diet leaving cattle on a silage-only feed to gear them up for getting out to grass.
Cattle will be weighed in early April when they will receive a clostridial vaccine.
Dung samples are taken from a sample population of the cattle to identify the parasite burden and where this is an issue, cattle will be dosed accordingly.
The farm is all relatively dry and was previously in tillage so parasite issues have been relativity low to date .
Grass growth rates
The farm is grass measuring every week and growth rates are remaining surprisingly low on the farm with regrowths slow on most paddocks.
The average farm cover on Wednesday, March 23, was 880kg/dry matter (DM)/ha and growth rates were running at 18kg/DM/ha/day.
Soil fertility
Soil samples were taken at the end of January which identified what parts of the farm that need attention with Phosphorus (P) and Potassium (K) applications.
An area of the farm is Index 1 and 2 for P and K, so slurry will be targeted here throughout the year.
The silage ground’s soil fertility is very good, with results indicating Index 3 and 4 for P and K.
This ground receives farm yard manure in the autumn and is likely contributing to the good P and K indexes.
As a result of this, less slurry will be used on silage ground this year than in previous years.
About 70% of the farm was targeted with half a bag of urea on February 20.
After paddocks have been grazed out, slurry will be applied using a trailing shoe with a particular focus on paddocks with a low P and K index. This work will be carried out by a contractor.
The first half of the grazing season there are no plans to reduce fertiliser input as grass demand is high and good crops of quality grass silage are needed to be secured ahead of this winter.
In the second half of the grazing season, the farm may look into reducing fertiliser usage.
The farm has a high demand for grass at this time of the year, with 400 yearling cattle out grazing as well as 70ac stopped for silage so reducing fertiliser at this time of year is not an option.
Dry weather, good ground conditions and plenty of grass is resulting in a good start overall to the grazing season for 2022 on the ABP Demo Farm. The target weight gain from these yearlings at grass is 0.9/kg/day.
Stay tuned to Agriland for further updates on the ABP Demo Farm and the Advantage Beef Programme.