Producers are being encouraged to take steps to help minimise the risk of reduced forage stocks next winter.

“Wet weather conditions across the country may mean that producers have turned cows out onto a larger grazing platform than previous years, eating into land that would normally have been ear-marked for silage,” pointed out Rob Fowkes, nutritional advisor at QLF.

“While this may help solve the immediate problem, farmers need to be aware that this could lead to potential forage shortages next winter if steps aren’t taken now.”

In light of this, he suggested a two-pronged approach to help alleviate the problem. “Firstly, if young stock are yet to be turned out, I’d recommend keeping them in if possible so that you can shut up this extra grass for silage."

If you are keeping young stock in, he said reassessing and altering the ration will help stretch-out the forage available. “Where possible, producers need to try and conserve current forage stocks so they can be rolled over into next year if required.

“One way of doing this is to replace a proportion of the forage in the ration with straw. However, to avoid a drop in intake and subsequently performance, this needs to be managed carefully.

“Including a molasses-based product, such as TMR 30, can allow a higher proportion of straw to be fed without any detrimental effects. As it’s highly palatable, it encourages feed intake as well as binding the ration together which will reduce the opportunity for sorting,” he added.

If cows are out at grass, he added that an option would be to restrict the amount of time they are out, but an adequately balanced buffer feed will need to be provided to ensure nutritional requirements are still met.