Large crowds of suckler farmers gathered on the farm of Padraig Gerety, near Kenagh, Co. Longford, on Wednesday evening (April 19) to attend a farm walk focused on suckler breeding.
The event was hosted in association with the Teagasc advisory team and the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation (ICBF) and representatives from Bord Bia and Progressive Genetics were also present on the day.
The host farmer, Padraig Gerety, keeps 60 spring-calving suckler cows and 130 mid-season lambing ewes.
All heifers are finished under 24-months and males are sold as steers at 18 months.
All replacement heifers are calved at 24 months of age and Padraig has been doing this for the past 25 years.
The table below shows the Gerety farms’ 2022 Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) Vs the national average figures:
2022 KPIs Geretys National Average Calves/cow/year 0.97 0.87 Calving interval (days) 366 393 Mortality at 28 days (%) 3.2% 2.07% Six-week calving rate 95% 55% % of heifers calving at 22-26 months 100% 24%
There was a big emphasis at the farm walk on encouraging suckler farmers to examine ways to achieve a 24-month age at first calving for the replacement heifers on their farm.
Currently, only 25% of suckler heifers calve at 24-months of age and over the past 10 years, there has not been much change in this level.
Commenting on his strategy to calve heifers at 24 months of age, Padraig said: “You have the calf, and as well as that you have the most fertile animals and anything that doesn’t go in calf is still a young animal.
“If you leave them until three and they don’t go in calf, they’re overage for selling.
“It’s just the system that works for us, now this year’s maiden heifers for breeding are currently a bit lighter than I’d like them to be, but they didn’t get the right run of grass this year yet.”
Padraig said that the breeding season will start on the farm on June 1, and that he expects his heifers to have gained at least 50kg by then.
“They’ll be on a rising plain of nutrition the whole way through on grass and even when they go into the shed next winter, I will keep them pushed on,” he said.
How is 24-month suckler calving achieved?
Teagasc advisor Shane Devaney explained the average weight gain for weanling heifers on the farm was 1.14 kg/day which means the top heifers are probably doing 1.3 kg/day or more.
He said: “The first thing you have to do is pick out the heifers doing the highest daily weight gain. That’s key.
“When it comes to weaning at 8-9 months of age, it’s important to keep the weanling heifers thriving. On this farm, heifers are kept on the cow until late October and get meal outside until housing in late November.”
The Teagasc advisor said: “In the shed over the first winter, if you have poor-quality silage, they will gain very little weight. You need silage with a dry matter digestibility (DMD) value of 70% or above along with 1.5kg of a weanling concentrate/day.
“Heifers should go to grass in the spring as soon as weather permits. The earlier they get out, the earlier they can start doing the 1kg/day weight gain.
“The target is to bull these heifers at 15 months of age in June. Heifers born in March 2022 will be bulled in June 2023.
“The heifers were weighed and the aim is to bull them at 60% of their mature weight so in most cases, this is anything from 380-420kg.”