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Farming in the townland of Kiffagh between Ballyjamesduff and Kilnaleck, Co. Cavan, is Rodney Wilton, a name well-known and respected in the waste recycling industry as well as Irish rallying.
On Thursday, July 17, the Wilton beef farm opened its gates to Liffey Meats suppliers for a farm walk and Agriland was in attendance on the day also.
A newly built state of the art cattle shed on the farm attracted significant attention from the farm-walk attendees.
Nathan Galligan from Liffey Meats welcomed the farmers to the event and gave an overview of the system.
He explained that the farm enterprise finishes predominantly dairy-beef animals as heifers and steers with a smaller number of bulls also finished on the farm.
There is 250ac of owned land with additional land leased for silage production. There is shed space for approximately 700 cattle and approximately 150 cattle are on grass for the grazing season.
The farm has a big emphasis on efficiency, and making top-quality silage and managing soil fertility plays a key role in this.
A broad range of new technologies are being used on the farm to help maximise livestock comfort and performance.
Rodney gave an overview of the new shed and outlined some of the key features.
The pens are back-to-back and there is a slatted centre passage in the shed for taking cattle in and out of pens. Cattle are fed along the two outer sides of the shed.
There are concrete feed troughs down each of the outer sides of the shed, and the feed rail is a horizontal bar that rolls up, "allowing big and small animals to feed unrestricted".
The drinkers are fast-fill and fed by a pump. The farm originally used tip-out drinkers but when cattle were drinking after feeding, meal would fall into drinkers and was being wasted.
Rodney said: "The fast-fill drinkers can be emptied in a minute. The fresh water coming in agitates meal and the cattle consume this with the water so there is less meal wasted."
All rainwater can be harvested off the new shed and this is used for washing on the farm.
"At the four points of the shed, water can be directed to storm water or into a slurry tank," Rodney explained.
"Coming up to February, rather than draw water, the rainwater can also be directed to the slurry tank to help mix the slurry."
There is also an aeration system in slurry tanks which means agitated slurry is available at all times.
"We can go with slurry any time be it after grazing on paddocks or after silage to go out with the pipe system," Rodney said.
"We kept the roof of the shed high for ventilation and there is a longer roof overhang out each side of the shed if we ever need to close down the sides to prevent birds getting into the feed area. We will still have space for the diet feeder."
"There is good airflow through the shed, and the concrete troughs down each side prevent draughts when the cattle are lying. Thankfully, we have had no issues with pneumonia so far in the new shed."
There are three-separate underground slurry tanks below the shed - each running the length of the shed. There is a tank running down each side of the shed below the cattle and another running down the centre of the shed below the centre passage.
Slurry tanks are 11ft in depth, allowing for ample slurry storage on the farm and leaving no pressure on the slurry storage capacity in the spring time.
The shed has a built-in slurry separator, which leaves the solids in one pile and pumps the liquids into the centre tank.
This separated liquid is applied on grazing ground and has allowed the farm to drop a round of chemical nitrogen (N) application in the grazing season.
Rodney said: "We went for a three-phase separator. We have bedded pens and the idea is to cut down on sawdust bedding.
"Once the separated slurry is dried, we put it in as base layer with sawdust bedding on top."
There is also a sprinkler system fitted in the shed. There was previously pigs kept on the farm and this sprinkler system was taken from the pig shed and is mainly used to soak pens before washing after a batch of cattle leave the shed.
It is also used during high temperatures helping to keep cattle cool in the shed. Harvested rainwater is used for the system.
"The centre passage was slatted for the simple reason of less washing," Rodney told the crowd.
"We designed everything to be as labour-friendly as possible. Since the new shed was built, we have the same amount of staff handling almost twice the amount of cattle."
"We decided not to put a handling unit in the new shed, as we got advice that this can disturb the other cattle in the shed."
When leaving the shed, cattle walk down the centre passage and over to a separate handling facility.
Rodney said: "Before building the shed, we looked at different sheds around the country to see what they had implemented and how we could use it to our advantage.
"Some of it we came up with ourselves and other ideas we got from other people. It was quite a large investment so we wanted to get it as good as we could."
Conor Craig from Alltech and Adam Smyth from Keenan discussed the feeding system and diet feeder used on the farm and also outlined some of the feeding solutions offered by Alltech.
David Magee from Kiernan Milling discussed animal nutrition on the farm and outlined the two-main diets fed to the cattle that are housed for finishing.
The two main diets used on the farm are as follows:
Starter diet Finisher diet 16kg silage 12kg silage 0.2kg straw 6kg meal 3kg meal 4kg bread 1.5kg brewers 6kg brewers 1.4kg syrup 1.4kg syrup 27.1kg fresh (10.67kg dry matter) 29.4kg fresh (13.63kg dry matter)
The average weight gain on the starter diet is 1.45-1.5kg/day, with an average kill-out percentage of 49%.
On the finisher diet, the average weight gain is 1.7kg/day, with an average kill-out percentage of 51%.
The finisher diet provides 90g acid buff, 24g Mycosorb, 1,800mg Zinc, and 900mg Copper.
Magee emphasised the importance of a consistent diet when feeding total mixed ration (TMR), avoiding cattle sorting the feeds in the diet.
Kiernan Milling's David Magee
He said that cattle have been achieving as high as 1.65kg/day on the growing diet and added that whilst compensatory growth is part of this, good silage quality is key to achieving good performance.
L-R: Teagasc's Katie Kilmartin; Liffey Meats procurement manager Sean O'Beirne; and Liffey Meats sustainability officer, Nathan Galligan
Katie Kilmartin from Teagasc discussed the importance of maintaining good soil fertility, as well as the value of high-quality silage and good grassland management.
The event drew to a close with refreshments provided by way of Karen Wilton's artisan food service 'The Pigs Tale'.
