Kevin Moloney and his business partner Mike O’Neill farm 350 cows in Knockanore and have been farming together in a farm partnership for the last seven years. They both previously farmed in the Rural Environmental Protection Scheme (REPS) which was a scheme designed to reward Farmers for carrying out their farming activities in an environmentally friendly manner and to bring about environmental improvement on existing farms. Kevin is currently studying for a Diploma in Environment, Sustainability and Climate which is a joint venture between UCC and Tirlán.
As a young progressive dairy farmer, Kevin believes in working with nature to farm more sustainably. He has undertaken several initiatives to lower emissions on his farm including the planting of trees and hedgerows and installing two ponds and a nature area for wildlife.
Said Kevin: “Last May we started growing some multi species swards on our farm. This is a mixture of grasses, red and white clover and herbs, chicory, and plantain. The benefits of a multi-species sward is that they require reduced fertiliser while maintaining a steady growth rate. A sward with a clover content of between 20 to 50 per cent can allow fertiliser application in the summer months to be halved. Living in the scenic Blackwater Valley, it’s important to keep respecting this land and the nature around it”.
Beyond production, farmers are showing increasing levels of dedicaiton to the environmental wellbeing of their farms. Moving fences out from hedgerows and watercourses to increase field margins – the areas between the grazing pasture and the field boundary – leaves space for nature and helps to keep pesticides, fertilisers and slurry away from watercourses and hedgerows. Irish farmers continue to deploy innovative technologies and sustainable practices while producing the best quality milk in the world.
Jody O’Neill farms with his father Joe, where they have introduced clover into their mix, 25 acres of red clover as well as hedge rows and trees. They farm 100 cows and use a GPS system for fertiliser.
“As farmers we understand our obligation to the environment and as a community,” said Jody. “We are adopting new technologies and practices to reduce our impact and meet the challenge we have been set. My father has built a wind turbine on the farm, and we are also going to be installing solar panels in the coming year which will really help the farm to be even more sustainable. We have also introduced the planting of red clover on our farm since it helps maintain soil moisture and suppresses certain other weeds which uses less water and herbicide”.
Liam Smith farms a herd size of 200 cows at Coolbeggan in Tallow who cares for his animals as if they were his own kids. Liam is also a passionate advocate for using technology to support his sustainable farming gols. An example of such technology is Fitbit-like devices that dairy cattle wear all day long. More accurately, these devices are known as automated health monitoring systems (sometimes referred to as rumination collars).
“The health and welfare of my cows is crucial to me and so I have introduced modern technology on my farm to monitor them throughout the day,” said Liam. “These automated health monitoring collars sit around the cow’s neck and like a Fit Bit, they non-invasively keeps track of the cow’s rumination time and physical movement. These systems allow farmers like me to oversee a large herd without using a great deal of time and resources to do so.”
