Wet Weather Hitting Northern Ireland Agri Output

17 July 2007
By Richard Halloran
Farming Life

WEATHER is starting to impact on farms across Northern Ireland. The wettest June since records began is now starting to take its toll on farm output across Northern Ireland.

Dairy farmers are reporting significant drops in milk yield to Farming Life, second cut silage is a fortnight behind schedule and what was to have been the earliest start to the cereal harvest ever recorded in Northern Ireland is now a figment of growers' imaginations.

David Dunlop is currently milking 70 cows on the outskirts of Hillsborough in County Down. He told Farming Life that milk yields have dropped by four litres per day over the past fortnight and that, given the nature of dairy farming, this fall-off in output could not now be recouped no matter how well the weather picked up during the period ahead.
"We farm very dry ground and the paddocks are still in pretty good shape," he added. "But the cows are not settling, and that's despite the fact that we have given them access to a larger grazing area than would usually be the case for this time of the year. In order to keep milk yields at somewhere near normal levels we have decided to keep the herd in at night, feeding them a grass silage-based TMR. The fresh calvers are also getting a little bit extra in the parlour.
"We should be starting second cut silage next week. But given the state of the ground that just won't happen and, no doubt, any undue delay will serve to reduce forage quality."

Ayrshire breeder, Graham Smith, farms at the Birches in County Armagh. He is also reporting significant falls in daily milk yields and that's despite giving the cows a top up feed from the feeder wagon after morning and evening milking.
"Cows are also drying off earlier," he explained. "The land is now extremely wet and the gaps are well trampled. "I tried making some baled silage last weekend. But I had to give up, once the mower got away from the field boundaries. The ground was just cutting up too much."

County Down arable farmer, Allan Chambers, has confirmed to Farming Life that he could be cutting winter barley crops next week if the weather conditions were right. "But given the way that things have worked out it will be at least a fortnight before I will be able to get machinery on to the land. But it's not the end of the world. "Crops will not suffer unduly if this is the sort of timescale involved. The lack of sunshine over recent weeks may well have brought back yields slightly." According to Allan, the winter wheat and spring barley crops that he has seen over recent weeks have held up well, despite the ongoing cold and wet weather conditions. "There has been a small amount of lodging in some crops, but nothing to give any major cause for concern," he explained. "Disease pressure is low in those crops that were sprayed at the right time."

With regard to potatoes, Allan confirms that blight pressure is extremely high at the present time. He has maintained his traditional weekly, blight spray programmes and to date this has kept the disease at bay. "The only difference this year is that we have used a more expensive fungicide in order to maximize blight control. We farm in a very dry area and to date getting into the fields with the sprayer has not been a problem. But for farmers on heavier land, I can imagine that the deteriorating ground conditions are now giving cause for concern," he said.