Useful tips for beef farmers at ABP farm walk in Cavan

ABP Food Group hosted a suckler-beef farm walk in Arva, Co. Cavan, on the farm of Wilson Kells on Wednesday (October 27).

The event was organised by ABP Food Group’s Advantage Beef Programme’s farm liaison team and attendees were offered tips and advice on animal nutrition, animal health and farm schemes.

The event was well attended by farmers from the region with plenty of questions coming from the crowd on a range of topics.

Wilson farms with his wife, Pearl, and son, Nigel. The team has 60 commercial suckler cows and operates, primarily, a spring-calving herd.

Wilson is a member of ABP’s Advantage Beef Programme. This processor-led initiative is a sustainability scheme for beef farmers which rewards eligible cattle with a 20c/kg sustainability bonus.

Bulls are finished at under-16-months of age on the farm and heifers are finished at under-24-months of age.

The soil type on the farm is heavy, so running the herd of commercial suckler cows requires careful management.

Both a Charolais stockbull and artificial insemination (AI) sires are used on the farm. There are a range of cattle breeds on the farm including Charolais, Simmental, Limousin, Aberdeen Angus and Hereford.

Herd performance statistics on the Kells suckler farm:

2021/2022 breeding performance:

At the event, Wilson gave an overview of his farming system. He told farmers that the only change he had to make to his system to become eligible for the Advantage Beef Programme 20c/kg sustainability bonus was with regards to weighing his cattle.

ABP’s farm liaison officer Oisin Lynch gave an overview of the ABP Demo Farm and the Advantage Beef Programme’s requirements.

The Advantage Beef Programme farm liaison team leader Amie Coonan delivered an interesting presentation on animal nutrition.

She spoke about the importance of testing silage quality and also gave an overview of how to interpret silage test results.

She explained that while many farmers look at the dry matter (DM) and the dry matter Digestibility (DMD) values of silage, there are other parameters which should be taken account of in silage test results too.

Understanding silage results:

Amie also said that feed labels should be examined by farmers to see the composition of the ration they are feeding. The ingredients of a feed ration are listed in descending order starting with the ingredient that has the highest presence.

The energy that an animal can use is measured in terms of UFL. One UFL unit has the same energy value of dried barley.

UFL of raw materials for beef rations:

The third speaker on the day was MSD Animal Health’s Niall Brennan, who spoke about vaccination protocols that help reduce the risk of Bovine Respiratory Disease (BRD) in cattle during winter housing.

Brennan said that vaccination is part of the solution to animal health, but stressed that other factors such as biosecurity, management, hygiene and housing facilities are all important parts of the animal health equation too.

He said that Bovine Respiratory Disease (BRD) is the most common cause of sickness and death in cattle over one month of age and gave an overview of the vaccination products on offer to help mitigate the risk of a BRD outbreak in a herd.

The final speaker on the day was agricultural advisor Johnathan Anderson, who gave farmers an overview of the Agri-Climate Rural Environment Scheme (ACRES).

Johnathan explained that different measures will suit different farmers in ACRES and took questions from the farmers in attendance on aspects of the scheme.

The event concluded with lunch and a discussion among the farmers in attendance on various issues and current affairs in the farming world.