Farmers Visiting Farmers

There is no substitute for face to face interaction. Some of the best interaction at Global 500 takes place on our farm tours, which are scheduled before and after the sessions. Dairy and beef farmers from all over the world had the chance Monday and Tuesday to visit some of Ireland’s most progressive farms. Tours are also scheduled for Friday and Saturday. Over the next several weeks we will be posting interviews from the Irish host farmers and farmers from all over the world who went on the tours.

In the meantime we have some great photos from the tours on our Dairy Heroes Facebook page and we will be adding more photos over the next couple of days.

Here are highlights from some of the farms that we visited. Thanks to Farm Tours Ireland for coordinating them for us.

Dairy Farms

Pat Callan, Philipstown, Co. Louth
This farm milks 160 Montbeliarde cows and the annual herd average is 8,000 litres. The herd is split, calving between autumn and spring. A large emphasis is placed on detailed grazing management and all forage is produced on the farm in the form of grass and maize silages.

Michael McDonnell, Termonfeckin, Co. Louth
The herd produces an average of 10,000 litres annually and is split between autumn and spring calving. High quality grass silage and maize silage are an essential part of the farm strategy to achieve high performance.

Bingham Farm, Co. Antrim
The Binghams milk 500 high-yielding Holstein cows. They produce quality grass silage as the main forage source and achieve excellent yields from their forage inputs. Recent investment in housing and milking facilities has resulted in production benefits.

Beef Farms

Tara Farms Ltd., Dunboyne, Co. Meath
Tara Farms is a large-scale feedlot finishing approximately 1,500 animals annually. There is a mixture of bulls and heifers, all produced for the Italian market, a premium market for Irish beef producers. Excellent weight gains and high levels of efficiency are achieved on this farm.

Moyvalley Meat Farm, Co. Meath
Moyvalley Meat Farm is integrated with Moyvalley Meats and finishes approximately 2,000 steers and heifers throughout the winter period. Quality grass silage is produced on the farm.

Brian McCabe, Co. Louth
This farm is a small feedlot, finishing 600-700 animals annually, which are mainly heifers for the Italian market. Mr. McCabe produces grass and maize silage and feeds them together with large volumes of homegrown wheat and barley. The unit achieves impressive weight gains and high quality carcasses.

Joseph O’Reilly, Co. Louth
This farm has 110 crossbred cows which are split between calving in autumn and spring. All animals are finished on farm. Mr. O’Reilly has a preference for using Limousin as the terminal sire. All forages produced on the farm are of the highest quality.