Grass 10 champion, Colin Doherty, joins Emma-Louise Coffey on this week’s Dairy Edge to explain how he and his father have developed their dairy farm and built a repeatable grass-based system.

Colin says that, while the farm was in winter milk until 2005, grazed grass was always the core feed that drove their milk production. 

This has continued since they transitioned to spring milk production where they feed predominantly grazed grass with supplement input of ~500 kg and some silage during the lactation. 

Colin says the preference is to feed silage or zero grazed grass from the out-block where grass growth (and supply) are low, to support as much of the cow’s diet from home grown feed.

Colin explains that they previously strived to grow up to 17 tonnes of grass but in more recent years they have reduced the amount of chemical Nitrogen applied and therefore, 15 tonnes is a realistic number. 

In the future, they aim to spread 150 kg N in the form of Protected Urea while also continuing to incorporate LESS and increasing the level of white clover.

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The Dairy Edge is a co-production with LastCastMedia.com