A total of 78% of the 1.68 million calves registered to-date this year have came from the dairy herd, according to the latest calf registration figures from the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation (ICBF).

As of Friday April 28, a total of 1,688,504 calves have been registered on beef and dairy farms across Ireland.

Of this figure, 1,325,143 or 78% were born on dairy farms while 363,361 or 22% were born on suckler farms.

The total number of calves born to-date this year has remained virtually on par with last year with only an additional 674 calves registered in the first 17 weeks of this year. However, on closer examination of the figures, one sector has fallen while the other sector has increased.

Calf registrations on various farms

The number of calves born on dairy farms has increased by 23,422 head while the number of calves born on suckler farms has fallen by 22,748 to date.

This is a trend which has been occurring over the past number of years where the number of calves from suckler herds is falling while the number of calves born on dairy farms is continuing to grow.

The decline in suckler numbers is similar to the increase in progeny born from the dairy herd resulting in the overall number of calves registered to-date this year remaining relatively steady.

While the vast majority of calves from the dairy herd are born in the first quarter of the year, larger numbers of suckler-bred calves tend to be registered later in the year.

In 2022, a total of 815,000 suckler-bred calves were registered in Ireland while 1.59 million calves were registered in the dairy herd resulting in an overall total of approximately 2.4 million calves registered in Ireland in 2022.

This year’s calf registration figures are expected to remain somewhat similar to last year with a slight decline likely in suckler births and dairy-bred births likely to remain similar or increase slightly.