Forage for Knowledge

With warmth and moisture, the 2019–2024 growth curve suggests 55–60 kg DM/ha/day through June.

If there are no heatwaves in the next few weeks, growth should stay close to the long term average.

Grass quality has dipped

Recent analysis shows average metabolisable energy (ME) at 11.2 and crude protein (cp) at 19.5%.

The cp is not limiting, as cows typically need around 16%. However, ME has dropped below 12. This drop is expected. Late heading perennial ryegrass usually goes to head in the first two weeks of June.

Reset for quality leafy grass

We need to reboot the system and get the paddocks back into leafy, vegetative, high-digestibility grass.

At 60 growth, a 21-day round is achievable. Shorten the round in another two weeks to move past heading.

If you have any stalky paddocks and or rejection spots, use a mower to reboot the system.

If growth is above demand:

• Take out excess paddocks into bales
• Pre- or post-mow paddocks to maintain correct residuals and drive quality

These steps will restore grass quality and improve utilisation.

Use grass to challenge concentrate

Once quality recovers and growth remains strong, there’s an opportunity to reduce concentrate feeding.

A client of mine who autumn calves has reduced concentrate to 200 g per milking as a parlour bait for the last six weeks.

His buyer doesn’t want to pay high prices or have excess milk, so my client dropped concentrate to save cost and pulled back production a little. Despite this:

• Milk yield held steady at 17.5 litres
• Milk solids remained at 1.6 kg MS
• Costs were reduced without compromising performance

For Spring calving herds there is an opportunity to drop concentrate once we are through grass heading.

Many will not drop whilst serving cows, but, where there is reasonable weather and no additional stessors such as Tb Testing, there is opportunity.

Try dropping 0.5 kg and see what happens. For a 300-cow herd a 1 kg reduction equates to around £320 per weeks in savings.

For a 300-cow herd, a 1 kg reduction equates to around £320 per week in savings.

Check your figures

To check energy supply and demand in your own system, use the calculations in the AHDB First Forage Guide (pages 25 and 26).