Grass growth rates appear to be holding on farms, with most farms now having a surplus of grass on their wedge.
Although rain was wanted by many farmers, the amount that has fallen in recent days has made grazing conditions on many farms challenging.
Although it is important to keep grass in the diet, it should not be done if damage is being caused to land.
Good grazing management practices are needed over the coming days and weeks to ensure that grass intake remains high, but land is not damaged.
Best advice is to make use of multiple enters and exits from paddocks to prevent damage and if needed, put up strip wires.
Ideally at this time of year the strip wire shouldn’t be needed, but in cases it may be warranted in order to prevent damage.
On drier farms, grazing conditions are still good, so there shouldn’t be a need for strip wire to be used just yet.
Grass growth
The latest figures from PastureBase Ireland show current growth rates of 53kg of dry matter (DM)/ha for Leinster, 54kg of DM/ha for Munster, 56kg of DM/ha for Connacht and 60kg of DM/ha for Ulster.
The warm weather along with the recent rainfall has resulted in an increase in predicted grass growth for the coming days.
There are predicted growth rates of 60kg of DM/ha forecast for Leinster, 54kg of DM/ha for Munster, 53kg of DM/ha for Connacht and 53kg of DM/ha for Ulster.
Second cut
The break in the weather of the last number of days has seen many move to harvest second-cut silage.
Weather would have had many fearing that second cut would be harvested much later this year, but for those that have cut it is far off the mark.
Once second cut is harvest farmers then need to decide if they are going to harvest a third cut or maybe correct the fertility of the soil in these fields.
Lime could be spread after second cut on silage fields to correct the pH and ensure farms are getting the most out of these fields.
Otherwise these fields could be used to harvest a third cut, if fodder supplies are not sufficient.