Sheep equipment and technology company, Cotter Agritech, together with expert speakers from Sheep Ireland, Teagasc and the Easycare Sheep Society, are running a series of open days across the country on Tuesday, May 21, and on Wednesday, May 22.
The theme is “techniques, technology and equipment to tackle problems on a modern sheep farm”.
Each open day will feature a farm walk, an in-depth look at the farms brand new handling facilities, a showcase of the latest sheep equipment and technology from Cotter Agritech, interactive speaker sessions on Anthelmintic resistance and breeding for a better bottom line, and a number of trade stands.
Open days
The May 21 open day will take place at Brian and Alison Nicholson’s farm in Co. Kilkenny, which is a large operation running 1000 ewes on 100ha.
Brian finishes the vast majority of his lambs on grass only, performance records his flock, and recently converted to a Cotter Crate system.
The May 22 open day will take place at Padraig Frasier’s farm in Co. Mayo. Padraig runs a smaller operation typical of the west of Ireland, with a flock of 150 Mayo blackface ewes who are crossbred onto Texel and Suffolk rams.
Padraig recently made his first major investment into handling facilities, putting in a Cotter Crate system to reduce labour and hardship.
Each event will start with a farm walk where guest speakers will chat with the farmer about 2024 lambing performance, flock management, farm key performance indicators (KPIs), grassland management, what’s working well and what are the challenges, and future plans.
Participants will then move to the handling area to see each farmers new facilities, where the Cotter Crate Sheep and Lamb Handler will be demonstrated live.
Farmers will also see the first public showing of the Cotter Crate Mobile models, which are road-legal trailer mounted Cotter Crates complete with a mobile yard to suit farmers with fragmented land blocks.
The company will also showcase the Automed automatic dosing gun product for the first time.
There will be a presentation on how to maximise the TAMS grants available for investment in sheep handling equipment and yard design options.
Other presentations will include ‘overcoming drench resistance’, delivered by Dr. Steven Johnston, a farmer and sheep advisor running Easycare sheep who struggled with diagnosed drench resistance.
Steven will share his story, results of using the SmartWorm technology for the last few years (50% cut in drench use) and how he is using data to breed for resistance to parasites.
David Coen, Head of Hill Sheep Breed Improvement at Sheep Ireland will explain what performance recording can deliver to farmers.
Trade stands on the day include Cotter Agritech, Sheep Ireland, Easycare Sheep Society, Cormac Tagging, TrueNorth Technologies (Grasshopper), Organic Trust and the Irish Organic Association.
All are welcome to attend.
