Edward Earle, Gorey, Co. Wexford, works as a quality engineer and farms over 300 ewes in partnership with his parents.
I seem to mention the weather every week, but I suppose it’s a topic that we are constantly discussing as farmers.
We finally got some decent rain down here in Wexford, from Wednesday onwards last week.
Overall, we got 18mm of rain and it was great to see the grass green up in the paddocks as a result. Little things like seeing a puddle again seem a novelty after so long. With this rain and warm weather, grass growth should pick up nicely over the next few days.
Sub-dividing
One thing we are doing on the grazing platform is sub-dividing the paddocks around the yard with a temporary electric fence of 3 strands.
We are trying to get the sheep to clean out the paddocks better because the groups are smaller around the house as these are the ewes with the younger lambs.
We don’t like mixing young lambs with older lambs, because they are at different stages of growth and development and can easily just get lost in the bigger group. The cleanout recently hasn’t been up to the standard we like.
It has also made us look at our water drinker location in some of the paddocks. We have moved two drinkers to more central locations in the paddocks to allow for sub-dividing.
Catching up
This has also been a week of catching up on odd jobs around the farm, fixing up wire and replacing broken stakes, hanging new gates where gates had gone rotten and broken.
One good thing with the fine weather it has provided a great opportunity to get painting done around the farm. Fields gate and walls being touched up.
Next week
We will start weaning next week. We wean lambs at around 12 weeks of age, and they will get the first grazing on the paddocks.
