Teagasc advisors give us an insight into some of the people involved in West Cork’s farming story. This week Teagasc advisor Mark O’Sullivan profiles Gavin Forde in Horsehill, who has brought technology into play on his farm
GAVIN Forde farms with his wife Jane in Horsehill overlooking the Bandon River near Ballinadee. They have two boys Benjamin and Oliver who are both interested in farming and are a great help when they are not in school. Gavin also works off farm and he says that he wouldn’t be able to do this without the help of his father Don and mother-in-law Carol.
In 2020, Gavin upgraded his housing facilities and installed a robotic milking machine for his herd of 62 cows. The old milking parlour was over 40 years old and needed to be upgraded.
Gavin has embraced the added technology that a robot brings to the business. It has allowed him to be more flexible with his working day and the added technology has enabled the farm to be more labour efficient. ‘The roadway network of the farm was already very efficient, but to maximise the grazing efficiency of the robot, some new farm roadways were added.’ What is very noticeable on robotic farms is the relaxed nature of the cows as they are rarely herded. One big benefit of this is that cows are always walking at their own pace, which minimises the risk of lameness on the farm.
Like most other Spring calving herds, February and March are particularly busy with 85-90% of the herd calving down in six weeks with the last cow calved by the first week in April. Gavin noted that April calving cows increases both the labour requirement and cost structure of the farm business as these cows would have to be milked over the winter months. Having a small number of cows milking through the winter is not financially attractive and it can be more challenging to maintain milk quality in the bulk tank.
Cows ready to use the robot milking machine on the farm.
Gavin has continued the excellent breeding his father Don had done and continues to focus breeding decisions on milk percentages, fertility, and more recently TB. ‘The herd EBI is in the top 5% nationally at €234. Last year the herd produced 460kgMS/cow at 4.54% fat and 3.69% protein. The herd is on target to do over 500kgMS/cow in 2024,’ said Gavin. Improving fertility through EBI and breeding will lead to a lower replacement rate requirement and also gives greater flexibility around culling decisions. This in turn will lead to a more efficient herd as the average lactation of the herd will increase.
Grass utilised is one of the biggest factors affecting farm profitability on dairy farms. Gavin emphasised that grazing management in the first year of the robot was challenging as he was managing three separate grass areas in the ABC grazing system. ‘You have to be accurate with grass allocations as when grass covers are too high, cows will not clean paddocks out sufficiently,’ said Gavin. This will lead to a poorer quality sward in subsequent rotations and will reduce cow movements in the robotic system.
When we walked the farm recently there was lots of clover in the paddocks. Gavin has reduced the amount of nitrogen spread on the higher clover content paddock. He noted that in order to simulate the clover to fix nitrogen you must first reduce the amount of nitrogen spread to increase the clover content. Most of the clover was established through a full reseed. Gavin plans to increase the level of clover on the farm and last year he also sowed a field of mixed species sward. The plan going forward is to reduce the chemical nitrogen significantly in the high clover content paddocks.
Gavin has a big emphasis on water quality on his farm. Last summer he has carried out significant amounts of work to minimise the amount of rainwater run off directly entering watercourses. Large quantities of rainwater run off from the public road travels across the fields and into a watercourse. Gavin has installed silt traps and has bunded around the main watercourse to trap any silt and sediment entering into the watercourse. Several of the water troughs have also been moved over 20m from any drain on the farm.
Gavin is a cousin of Glenn Forde, who won the Carbery Milk Quality Award earlier this month.
• Mark O’Sullivan is a B&T Dairy technology advisor in the Teagasc advisory office Clonakilty
