It almost took until the final quarter of the year for the weather to come good and that was welcomed by farmers across the country. It took serious pressure off and allowed field work to be complete for tillage farmers and allowed livestock farmers graze later than usual to make […]
A non-profit initiative founded in 2018 under the auspices of the Burren Beo Trust, Farming for Nature’s mission is to support, encourage and inspire farmers who farm, or who wish to farm, in a in a way that will improve the natural health of our countryside. Publishing in December, the […]
The week of sunshine around the ploughing has drifted into distant memory and you’d swear we have just skipped October and gone straight into November. Southeasterly wind storms tend to be the worst here and the one on the last weekend of September left every east-facing window with a spattering […]
I hate wishing time away but after 14 months of hoping next week’s weather will be better, it seems that’s just what I’ve done. I’ve written this year off as a grazing season and I’ll just manage it out for the rest of the year. When it comes to stymied grass […]
Skibbereen’s Olympic rowers may have dominated the West Cork gold medal winning headlines of late but a world title also found its way to the region in August writes Tommy Moyles. Clonakilty’s Jer Coakley was one of two Irish ploughmen to win on the world stage in mid-August, on the […]
I can’t recall as challenging a 12 months in farming as the past year, even looking back to the extremes in 2012 with a washout summer and accompanying fodder crisis into May 2013. Fast forward five years and it got more extreme. Beginning with hurricane Ophelia in October 2017, through […]